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February 28th, 2009 admin

The Internets Ugly Secret

The Internet’s Ugly Secret
By
Bill Reid-Internet Marketing Specialist

I am going to prepare you for a reality check. Get ready.

You know how the authority figures in your life have always prepared you for bad news by getting directly to the point with a statement something along the line of “I am going to make this ‘short and sweet’… and then drop the ‘bad news’ hammer on you? Well, get ready for something close to that, but not quite so ‘sweet’.

Taking advantage of widespread lack of knowledge

There is a great big ugly secret that hangs over the Internet these days and it’s getting bigger by the minute, literally. Because of the great “rush” to the Internet by consumers, which has been likened to the “Gold Rush of 1849”, but multiplied by hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, (And it’s not just happening in California either), many legitimate companies, along with some that are not legitimate, are racing to make sure that they get an edge in this great new “advertising” and “information” medium. In their effort to increase their Internet presence in a meaningful way, they have resorted to providing most if not all of those who join them in the marketing of their products and services with “their own” website as part of their “enticement” package. They hope that by spending some money on the development of a beautiful website, with lots of neat “bells and whistles”, they will cause the uninitiated prospective associate to “join” their organization. And really, there’s nothing particularly wrong with that, except that the “uninitiated prospective associate” believes that the site that they are being provided will be the answer to all their hopes and dreams and now they will be able to “cash in” on this bonanza just like the pioneers of the Internet have. It will all be so easy. New customers will flock to their website, because it’s pretty, and buy lots of goods and services and the money will start rolling in. Work will be a thing of the past and everyone will be happy. Right? Well, not quite right. Everyone will have a site alright, but think about that for a minute. Everyone will have a site!

Ignorance takes on a new meaning

I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, but just think about the ramifications of what it means for “umpteen thousand” people, all of whom are bright enough to see the benefit of marketing products and/or services on the Internet, where there is literally a worldwide market for the right product or service, to have identical websites. If everyone who joins an opportunity has the same “website” but just with a different “ID” number to designate it as theirs, then how can you separate yourself from the crowd so that masses of consumers will find your site and buy from you? The answer is…You can’t. And that is the great big ugly secret of the Internet!

Why millions of replicated “affiliate sites” around the world are ineffective

Search engines are wonderful creations that help people find information. That is the main purpose of their existence other than making their creators and operators lots of money. They just want to make sure that anytime someone puts a search term in their little search window, a list of sites that provide information on that particular subject will be displayed for the searcher to review, and hopefully, to pick from for the information they are seeking. That’s the way it’s supposed to work. But, then when thousands of people are using identical sites to market the same products, the search engines have to make an adjustment. Since it makes no sense to list these thousands of sites every time someone looks for one of the products that is offered there, they don’t list any of them at all! So in the end, it doesn’t matter how pretty or functional the website you are given, and in many cases charged a fee for the use of, as a benefit of becoming a part of a particular marketing organization.

There’s even more bad news

As a “user” of the “replicated” or “affiliate” site, you are just that, a user. You have no control over anything to do with “your site”. You don’t own it, and in most cases, you don’t have the ability to change the content or any of the information about the content of the products or services offered on it. As a user of these types of sites, the only control you have is to continue paying the bill, either through your membership or other fees, and keep it out there in cyberspace so that you can hand someone a business card or run a newspaper ad, pass out a flyer or otherwise distribute something with the URL (name of the site) on it and tell them that they should go there and buy some of your products. Probably not exactly what most folks have in mind when they make the leap into cyberspace.

For every ugly secret there’s an ugly answer

Ok, so now you have just signed up for that latest and greatest network, MLM, or direct marketing business and you are all fired up about getting rich with “this one”. Maybe that’s part of the reason you are reading this article to begin with. But the main reason you are excited will have something to do with the quality of, and demand for, the product that you have chosen to become associated with, but there is also some spark of hope that this thing called the Internet will be the missing link to success that has evaded you in the past. You have one of these company sponsored website and you are already online. Then, wouldn’t you know it, you stumbled up on this article and here’s some guy blasting away at the very idea that there might be some hope for you and that the “easy” riches that so many hope for through the use of the Internet may not be so easy after all, maybe not even possible.

Worthwhile advice from the Old Timers

There’s an old saying that goes something like this…”If you can’t propose a remedy for a problem, then you shouldn’t keep talking about it”. This sounds like good advice to me, and I think you’ll be glad that it does and here’s why. When I found myself in the same situation as I’ve just described in the previous paragraph, for about the second time, getting a dismal return for all the effort and high expectation for those endeavors, I started to look for a way to make these “affiliate” or “replicated” sites actual do something for me. After all, I was paying for them and they had my name on them, so there must be a way to promote them to more than just the handful of people I might bump into on the street or in the course of my normal daily activities. Fortunately, after many months of “self education” and “trial and error” starts and stops with many different attempts, I was able to find a way to get it done, and without spending an arm and a leg to do it.

Prepare yourself for another reality check here

The first thing that has to happen if you are to do what I have done, and am still doing, is that you have to learn how to lose. Yes, that’s right, you have to learn how to lose the idea that there is anything “easy” about competing with literally millions of other people around the world for a spot in a search engine that will render the results that you need in order to make a go of any “online business” let alone one that you are trying to run with an “affiliate” or “replicated” website. Another thing you will have to lose is the idea that it won’t cost you something other than your time, which by the way, is the most valuable asset you own, and it is irreplaceable. So we can begin to learn how we can turn these “lemons” that we are calling “affiliate or replicated sites”, into “lemonade” with the following assumptions:

• That the solution won’t be easy • That the solution won’t be free • That the solution does work

Of course you wouldn’t know at this point whether the solution that I am about to share with you works or not since you haven’t had the opportunity to see it, so let me get right into an outline of the solution that can help you overcome “The Internet’s Ugly Secret”.

Creating something that no one else has

Remember that we said that the search engines wouldn’t “index” your affiliate or replicated site because it was not any different that all the others that were assigned to all the other associates who signed up to work with the company that actually owns the site? Well, then the first order of business is to make sure that you are different. If you can’t change the company’s site, then how is it possible to be different? Very simply, create your own business identity with a unique domain name that you register as your own, and then promote that URL with an inexpensive single page website that can be used to “refer” to other sites on the Internet. There are a number of ways to accomplish the project that I’ve just outlined.

One, you can hire it done if you have the money, and believe me, there are lots of folks out there who are more than willing to take your money on this one. Once you know how you will wonder why they charge so much for the services that we are about to describe.

The second way you can get it done is by taking a little time to learn about the tools and the process that is required to make it happen, and do it yourself. This is not a particularly complicated process, but most people have no idea how to accomplish these simple tasks. There are ways you can acquire the information and knowledge of the tools and process for little more than the time you spend to learn. How much time you spend learning is dependent largely on your abilities, so it’s difficult to quantify that part of your investment. We do know, however, that the things that you will have to pay for are very affordable even for the most modest of circumstances. So when we say this is a “doable” process for the vast majority of people out there who are, at the least, computer literate, I mean just about everyone who owns a computer and has a reasonably good connection to the Internet. Let’s take the process of getting you set up on the Internet a step at a time now. It will go like this.

• First, register a domain name that identifies you or your business • Second, set up an inexpensive “hosting” plan • Third, create a simple website that identifies you and your business, that can refer visitors to your “affiliate site” • Forth, post that website on your “host server” where you will have a unique “Internet address” • Fifth, manually index your new website with the major search engines • Sixth, set up an automated submissions and promotion campaign that will keep your site active on many other sites. • Finally, as you evolve through this process, you will have learned much, and the newly acquired information will need to be “reinforced” with additional study of some sort.

Since you are now on the Internet and, hopefully, moving your products well enough to make some money, you will want to find and associate with others who are involved as well. Look for and find a mentor to help steer you to the right places to get the goods you need to get started. I personally use the folks at www.trafficwizardpromotions.com An eStore for all my Internet tools and supplies. Not because they are necessarily the biggest retailer on the Internet, but because I know the guys who run the business and they treat me right and offer good prices and support. And beside all that, when you get ready to promote your webpage they offer a very good, cost effective submission and promotion system at www.sitesubmissionspromotions.com that will make your promotion almost effortless.

Of course there are literally thousands of Internet businesses that can sell you the goods you need to become an entity on the Internet. Some will charge you more than others, some will offer good support when you have technical issues that you don’t understand, and some will not. It pays to look around a little bit and not jump into the first offer you see. Talk with others who have gone before you and let them tell you how to avoid some of the pitfalls, and avoid some of the less reputable businesses available. It is much better to know well ahead of time who is good and who is not, than it is to get knee deep into a business relationship only to find that you have to stop and start over because some couldn’t live up to their commitments.

Life offers no guarantees

In conclusion, I want to give you fair warning. There are millions of products that are being sold on the Internet, and there are lots of people out there selling them. Some are making money and some are not. Just because you have a product that you think is the next “best” and “greatest” thing to come along for the use of mankind doesn’t mean that there is a wide spread demand for that product. Your actual belief means nothing really. Take the time to do some thinking about what you are selling and the times in which you are selling it. Think about who your market is and how they might react to purchasing your product on the Internet. Is the demographic you are targeting young, old, gender specific or some other criteria that will limit or enhance your ability to get your business’ products in front of them? Are your products proprietary in nature? Do they fill a recognized need? And if people do need them, how do they go about finding the product? Do they search the Internet or is it something that can easily be acquired at the local grocery next time in? Which search engines might they use if they do look for products or services, Google, Yahoo, Alta Vista, or any of the hundreds of search engines that are available? And if they are searching the Internet, what are the terms that they use when they search? These are good questions and they need to be answered.

Who do you trust?

Don’t make the mistake of thinking that someone else has already done all the necessary research for you. There is at least a chance that they have, but most likely the research that they have done is about knowing how many people there are out there who might be looking for an opportunity and would be willing to pay for the right to be associated with them, especially if there is a nice looking website involved. My advice to you is to form your own opinions. Get input from others for sure, but in the end you are the one who will have to do the work, and either reap the reward or suffer the loss, so make sure that you are doing what you are doing because it is something that you believe in and are willing to commit time and energy to its development and eventual success. To help you toward that end, I offer a free consultation that will help identify your strengths and weaknesses.

You can reach me through my “Who Is” website at www.billreid.info or email me bill@billreid.info

(read more)

Are You Thinking About A Home Business?

Are You Wondering?
Why Start a Home Business

As I go about discussing the virtues of having one’s own business as opposed to working for someone else, I am often confronted by the unspoken question that lurks in almost everyone’s mind, and that is, “Why should I start a home business?” I should be quick to add that, at least in my opinion, a home business is not for everyone. Some just are not suited to the task. There are certain personality traits and human characteristics that do not lend themselves to support the discipline that is required of a home business operator. But, with that said, I find that, in general, there are a number of ways that a home business can be “customized” to the operator in such a way as to optimize their chance of success. Identifying limitations and strong points are the key, but that’s a topic best reserved for a later article.

Rent or Buy

I believe the best way to answer the question of why anyone who is qualified should start a home business, is a simple analogy to either buying or renting a home in which to live. If you think of a “job” as “renting an income”, the same way you rent an apartment or house on a temporary basis, compared to “buying” a house or condominium, where you actually assume “ownership”, and begin to accumulate an equity in the property, then a “job” seems to be a more tenuous occupation opposed to developing your “own” income source that you control.

It’s about Control

A job is only as secure as the company that provides the work that constitutes the position that you occupy with them. If something happens to that company, whether it’s an internal matter or external forces that affect it, you will be affected as well. As we look around today we see company after company in a broad range of industries that are suffering due to the forces of the economy. High fuel prices are just one of the factors that cause major changes in some companies, like those in the transportation industry. The airlines, for instance, are struggling. They have to raise fares in order to offset the increased cost of fuel, and that affects the numbers of people who fly. The eventual outcome of the situation is that the employees are affected through no fault of their own, and some will loose their jobs as a result. Either way, internal or external, the result is the same. No job, and no income.

Taking Charge

For those who are suited for, and have the ability, operating their own small home business offers another possible outcome when an economic disaster is looming on the horizon. They simply make the necessary adjustments, if needed, and continue to develop their businesses and along with them, the income that is needed to maintain their standards. By becoming your own employer you shortcut the process, and at the same time, take the limits off your creativity because everything that you do to “enhance” your own business will be a new investment that will add value for you.

So How Do You Find a Good Home Business

I think it comes back to the last part of the first paragraph of this article. Start by identifying strengths and weaknesses, and then, the most important part, find a way to apply the strengths, and mediate the effects of the weaknesses. In my opinion, the best course of action is to sit down with someone who can present first hand knowledge of the information you need to make a solid decision, take what is offered, use what you deem to be appropriate to your personal circumstance, then get into action with the plan you choose to use immediately. Once a suitable match becomes obvious you will know it, and action will happen. Inspiration will be automatic if you truly believe that you are involved with the right product or service. (read more)

Can Google Make You Money

Can Google Make You Money?

Have you bought a gallon of gasoline lately? 
In most locations around the U. S. the price for one gallon is at least $3.30, and it goes up from there, depending on how crazy the state government is where you live.  There are several states who have, through local legislation, forced the prices higher for environmental reasons, but it doesn't matter, the price is the price.  The real question is; can you afford the price if your business causes you to have to drive?

I have some good news for you!
If you are in a business that requires that you be "face to face" with your client or potential customer, then you may feel that you have to bear the expense of "getting there".  Suppose you have a product to sell that you feel must be demonstrated in person.  Aren't you still limited to a relatively small geographical area?  Even if gasoline was still selling for $1.00 a gallon, how much time do you have to sit behind the wheel, instead of in front of your client? What if there was a way to expand your market area without burning any gasoline at all, or sitting behind the wheel?

Have you ever thought of "Virtual Direct Selling"?
Virtual Direct Selling?  What's that you say?  Well, I am here to tell you that with the pressures that are placed on the American Consumers by an inept government that will never "get it" because they can't refuse special interest campaign contributions, you better be looking for the answer to the question.  The time is coming when business will have to change from the traditional "store front" or "brick and mortar", "stock it, advertise it, and sell it" concept.  Even the large retailers will have to use a model something like the old "Sears and Roebuck Catalog" of times gone by. (Most of you won't even remember them.), where they take orders at a central location, and then, when the customer has bought the product, ship it from a warehouse.  Pretty impersonal isn't it?

What if you don't understand the information about the product or have questions?
Wouldn't it be nice if you could talk to a "sales person", the same way you do out on the floor of some of the major retailers now?  Just hail a store employee and present your questions and get answers on the spot.  Most Americans, and a lot of other people around the world, are looking for instant everything, and information is no different. Now it can all be done "virtually", in other words, on the Internet, through the use of computers and communication technology that allows "one on one" sessions in real time.  Push a few buttons, click a link or two, and, presto, you are sitting at your computer, talking to a sales representative, getting real time answers, and possibly even a "live" demonstration to help you decide if this is the product that you want to spend your hard earned money for.

What if you had a product that could be marketed all over the U. S. and even Internationally?
Now we are back to the question of whether or not Google can make you money.  To me the answer is obvious.  If you have a product that almost anyone anywhere could use, if only they just knew about it, and you had a way of "reaching" them to ask for an opportunity to "demonstrate" your wonderful product, service or idea, doesn't it make perfect sense that you will need a way to get the word out about it, and you?  Google, my friend.  Google, properly approached can help you make money in several ways, but the main thing Google will do for you is to associate your name with whatever your wonderful product is, and put it in the right place for anyone who is searching for such a product.  Why is that important?  Credibility.  It's that simple.  Does it work?  Well, you be the judge.  Here's a current (at the time of this writing) Google search that will demonstrate my point. 

Don't burn gas, burn "bits"
In the next installment of this revealing series of articles I will focus on the tools you can employ to make possible a "virtual presentation" of just about anything you can sell.  Services, household products, even the big ticket items, and yes, even training for those who would like to move their efforts to the Internet.  Remember, you are just a couple of clicks away from the future, and when you click, your not burning gas, your burning bits.

Bill Reid-SEO Specialist
972-564-5716
Skype ID- BReid43
Who Is Bill Reid
Sign Up For A Free Virtual Business Consultation
Visit Bill Reid's Virtual Office
(read more)

Every Shooter Needs A Target

Every Shooter Needs A Target

You know, like in a basketball game? What if there were no goals at the ends of the court? What would the players do? Just dribble around for a while, pass a little bit and then finally when someone made a mistake, the other team would get the ball and do the same thing. Dribble, pass, and hope you can keep the ball... but what is the point. There is no point you say? Ok then, what is the point in having a web site, promotional system, domain name and keywords that don't match?
Everyone makes mistakes

If you didn't know any better than to do all the work that it takes to get a web presence going without coordinating your effort, that's ok, but that was then, and this is now and you are about to get the low down skinny that you needed in the beginning.

So Now Let's Do It Right

Here is the absolute bottom line when it comes to getting your online effort recognized by the search engines, especially Google. When you decide that you are going to market a product or business on the web, the first thing you need to do is try to get a name for your enterprise that describes what it is. Unless of course you have several millions of dollars to spend in a branding campaign. Does that make sense? I hope it does, but just in case, let's start at the beginning and use a ficticious product etc., to make the point.

Let's Suppose We Are Going To Sell "DoDads"

Our product, DoDads, is somewhat popular, but we want anyone who wants to buy a DoDad to be sure to find our online business site and buy it from us. So the first thing we want if possible is to give our business a name that contains the name of the product, but before we do, it is important to do some keyword research and find out exactly what it is that people use as a search term when they are looking for "DoDads", and we find that "DoDads" is the exact term, and it is searched frequently on a daily basis. So we can feel very comfortable if we name the business "DoDad Central". Fair enough? Since we like the name, the next step in the process is to see if we can obtain the domain name for our product. "DoDads.com" is available and we gather it up, along with .net; .info; and all the others that are available for the keyword we chose. The next step in the process is to set up our promotional system for the website that we intend to build, and that means Veretekk, and we want out system user name to mirror the domain, business and product name if at all possible. So we acquire DoDads.veretekk.com. Are we set now? Yes we are, but as you can see, this is a very oversimplified explanation. Things won't always work out so easily. Sometimes you have to get creative, but whatever you do, all the components of your effort need to match. Now the work can begin.

In our next installment we will talk about the most effective way of setting up the Veretekk System to promote a keyword. Stay onboard and be prepared for a nice surprise. It isn't as difficult as you may have been led to believe. And there's a shortcut I will share with you as well. Till then, good luck and good marketing.

Bill Reid-SEO Specialist
972-564-5716
Skype ID- BReid43
http://billreid.info
http://freeconsult.mygreatbig.info
http://billreid.info/virtualoffice/officewelcome.html
(read more)

Changing With the Times

Changing with the Times
Quite a few years ago, as a younger man, I was able to see the stark contrast between the lifestyles that we were living compared to that which our forefathers were able to manage in an earlier time, through the family pictures that were shared within our family. Just a few snapshots of the past that made it very easy to see the difficulties they faced, and the simplicity of the times as well. Life seemed to be so much more complicated for us, but it wasn't really.

As time has passed, and being fortunate enough to be aware of the changes that have occurred over my lifetime, it is difficult for me to not wonder how much more changes in the future will affect the lives of my children and grandchildren. There are so many changes coming, and they are coming very fast, that it is difficult to predict what "new" products or discoveries will be announced, even in the short term future. Who knows what the next great revelation will be in medical science in the next 6 months to a year? Who knows what advances in computer technology are on the near horizon? None of us really. Oh, there may be a few who are working in a specific field who will be aware of the advances in their area of expertise, but the general population is not. If only we could be made aware that the new and better products and systems are coming and will change the lives of just ordinary everyday people, whether they like it or not, perhaps we could avoid the stresses that are being suffered by most all cultures around the world. But we don't seem to be able to do that.

Based on what I have seen in the past, and what I am seeing as the "here and now" technology, along with the knowledge that our "knowledge base" in almost every field of endeavor, is growing at an exponential rate, it is difficult not to believe that radical changes will be necessary if we are to survive and remain economically secure.

One of the changes that I see as inevitable is the way in which many of us do business. The brick and mortar store front is on the way out. In the future, I believe, there will only be images of what we shop for on the World Wide Web. It is easy to see, with the current level of Internet technology, that there will be live online sales assistance, presentations, and meetings substituted for the old fashioned way of shopping, selling, and planning. Some businesses will grasp this new concept and some won't . Some will survive and some won't.

What interests me about this scenario, is the ability of anyone who cares to acquire a little bit of Internet knowledge, buy a little bit of computer equipment, then take their product or idea to the Internet with a sensible marketing campaign, will be able to get a "piece of the action", and do it at a very reasonable level of entry. It is becoming an "easy" accomplishment when you compare the cost, the knowledge, the dedication and commitment necessary for reasonable success, (which translates to additional income), to the rigors of starting a traditional "brick and mortar" business.

In subsequent posts, I will share my view on why and how these new online businesses will become the future, and outline the steps necessary for success. Stay tuned.

Bill Reid-SEO Specialist
972-564-5716
Skype ID- BReid43
Who Is Bill Reid
Free Virtual Business Consultation
Visit My Virtual Business Office (read more)

The Right Time, The Right Place

Are you ready to venture into the world of Homebased Internet Business Marketing?
 
Some believe that all you have to do to promote your business on the Internet is just throw up a web page and your done.  There are others who will advertise the page to the extreme, either with print, radio, or TV ads, which I find to be the most prevelant these days.  It seems strange to me that anyone would want to put millions of dollars into TV ads which are directed toward someone sitting in front of their TV set, and in most cases waiting for the commercial to end so they can get back to the programming that they were there for in the first place. I doubt very seriously that any of these "bodies" that the ad is directed toward, are sitting there with pad and pen in hand just in case they see a web address that the advertiser wants them to go visit.  More likely it's some kind of cold drink or a bag of chips, don't you think?  Just think of what you do when you are watching TV... Probably a lot of folks are doing exactly what you are doing.
 
So what I am suggesting is that these venues just mentioned might not be the best place to put the information that you want the "prospect" to see.  Wouldn't you rather have a person who is actually looking for what you are selling, to find it in a place where they can actually go and check it out?  A place where they are already engaged, and have focused their attention?  Perhaps in front of their computer,and with a window open to the most popular and effective search engine on the Internet, Google?  I think if I was selling anything, I would want to be visible at the very point where someone was interested in hearing or seeing about what I had to offer and that is exactly what can be done with the Veretekk Lead Generating System.
 
If you are engaged in a business, particularly a homebased, online, Internet business marketing effort, then I believe that you will serve yourself well, if you are not already, by learning more about how this wonderful system will help you market your business or idea to literally millions around the world.  Take a few minutes to get in touch and lets talk about how this system could be exactly what your business needs to explode your exposure in the right places. 
 
I am waiting.  Give me a call or visit me at the links provided and drop me a note.  Helping you succeed will only enhance my presence on the Internet, and my effectiveness for you.
 
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Bill Reid-SEO Specialist
972-564-5716 or toll free 866-209-8104
http://billreid.info
http://freeconsult.mygreatbig.info
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(read more)

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February 22nd, 2009 admin

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Social Bookmark Traffic Secrets
"Here's How You Can Get Loads Of FREE Traffic To Your Websites By Harnessing The Power Of The Popular Social Bookmarking Sites"

The Newbie Fast Track Guide
"Go From Newbie To Experienced Marketer In The Shortest Time Possible With This Easy To Follow Guide"

The Affiliate Guide To Non-Digital Sales
"Discover How You Can Increase Your Profits And Reduce Your Competition, By Promoting Real World Goods And Services Instead Of Digital Products"

Article Traffic Power Tips
"Here's The Easy Way To Drive FREE Traffic To Your Websites - Just By Writing A Few Short Articles..."

Maximize Profits With Simple Testing
"Here's How You Can Massively Increase Your Sales And Profits, Without Needing To Attract Any More Traffic!"

Twitter Marketing For Newbies
"Here's How You Can Learn To Market Successfully Through Twitter"

The List Building Fast Track
"Here's How You Can Easily Build Your Own Mailing List Of 1000+ New Subscribers In Less Than A Month, By Following My Simple Plan"

Build Your Business With Wordpress
"Here's How You Can Unleash The Power Of Wordpress, To Build Your Own Profitable Online Business"

The Outsourcing And Automation Report
"Save Yourself Lots Of Time And Effort, By Building Your Online Business Using Outsourcing And Automation"

(read more)

rudytelles

February 20th, 2009 admin

Rudy Telles Father & Son Refinishing, Riverside, CA

Rudy Telles Father & Son Refinishing, Riverside, CA

Spoilers

If you are looking forward to making your car stand out and unique in the crowd, then you just need to add top quality spoilers to your vehicle. Moreover, these are also helpful for augmenting the value of car when reselling it.  Car spoilers are basically some aerodynamic additions mounted normally on the topside of trunk or car or placed beneath front bumper. An appropriate spoiler can make over a dull and old looking car into a beautiful one and thus aids in stimulating the overall price of vehicle.

In the initial days, spoilers were only installed on esteemed sports cars and racing cars, mainly because of their utility value including lessening its drag and life and augmenting the down force.  However, these days, various street vehicles come equipped with these spoilers. Some most common types of spoilers available in the market are car spoilers including rear as well as front spoilers, hatchback spoilers, Truckcap spoilers and many more.

The spoiler installation methods are hassle free and does not involve any complicate installation, you can acquire these from Rudy Telles Father & Son Refinishing, Riverside, CA  at quite a reasonable price. If you really want to make your vehicle trendy, you should not negotiate in quality. The installation process of spoilers includes the usage of various devices and tools, so hiring of a professional installer is of extreme importance. Moreover, one can also get the idea about spoilers from the internet, a vast source of information.

So, use spoilers to make your car trendy and get a good return of your investment at Rudy Telles Father & Son Refinishing, Riverside, CA

(read more)

Dash Kits for your vehicle

http://www.rudytelles.com

Dash Kits for your vehicle

Are you keen to improve the inside of your vehicle? Then, one of the best ways of doing it is to incorporate a stylish dash kit that can add more to the luxuriousness and value of your vehicle. You do not need to go for those heavily priced dash kits; merely a wooden dash kit can solve the purpose. Even if, you are not fully pleased with the dash, then you can also go for dash kits of carbon fiber to render an exotic and striking outlook to the vehicle.

Besides, a wide range of other dash kits assortments have been also made available in the market by different manufacturers that put into use different materials and techniques to make the kits unique. However, before making your decision of purchasing one for your vehicle, you should consider keeping some important facts in your mind.

First and foremost is what is the amount that you can invest for including a dash kit in your vehicle? Then, it is the type of dash kit, such as whether wood dash kit or other, that needs to be considered. A real dash kit of wood will really give a warm look to your vehicle; however some imitation dash kits have been also made available by some renowned companies and you can not really tell the difference between them. Further, you also need to consider whether to use molded products or flats materials for making the overall outlook of your vehicle better.

So, bear the above-mentioned tips in mind and get the feeling of having the finest car in the world with Rudy Telles Father & Son Refinishing, Riverside, CA

Auto and Truck Refinishing Riverside CA., Spoilers, Wheel Covers, Graphics, Bodyside Molding, Custom Grills, Truck Steps, Truck Bedliners, Dash Kits

(read more)

Fall in Love with Your Vehicle Again!

Rudy Telles Father & Son Refinishing, Riverside, CA

Fall in Love with Your Vehicle Again!

Want your ride to look a bit different? I've got what you need to set yourself apart from the rest - Restyle with unique decals, hot graphics, cool chrome and more!

Our full line of car care products will help Renew and Revive your vehicle's finish and keep it looking great for years to come.

With over 20 years of experience in custom graphics design, vehicle accessory installation and literally hundreds of satisfied customers on the road, we prove to be the best in what we do - making you and your vehicle look good!

Father & Son Refinishing of Riverside, CA specializes in installing Spoilers and Runningboards from UCI United Covers Inc. and Factory Replacement Wheels and Wheel Covers from Coast to Coast International. We will "Customize Your Ride!" with products that come with a lifetime, nationwide warranty.

Your personal style. Different, expressive, exciting. Auto Trim Design puts that personal style behind the wheel and on the road, with everything you need to get the look you want. Innovators in automotive expression for over 23 years!

Rudy Telles from Father & Son Refinishing, installs the top brand name restyling products and accessories to enhance and protect your vehicle. Every installation is guaranteed.

(read more)

clothing

February 10th, 2009 admin

Flirting 101: Singles, Flirt Up Your Life!

Are you single and looking? Are you returning to the dating game after a long absence? Or are you just looking to sharpen your flirting skills? Singles, flirt up your life-it's time to let loose, be bold, and arm yourself with some new skills of seduction. The truth is, whether you've out of the singles scene or just terminally shy, anyone can learn a thing or two about the fine art of flirting.
Read more » Sexy New Arrivals (read more)

Online Flirt Game ? Fun And Desire

Dark Angel

Dark Angel
So, you are ready to join this fabulous online flirt dating game! Fine! More than fifty million of active subscribers of the U.S. online dating services, this opportunity is crucial for you, if you are single. This great tips article on online flirt activity will provide you with some ultimate online flirting tips and flirt sex advice. Read on to find out more! Read more » (read more)

cjroberson

February 5th, 2009 admin

Insurance Leads CJ20

Generating insurance leads online is easier than you think. In fact, there's a misconception that it's a difficult process when nothing could be further from the truth. The biggest mistake is that agents find themselves becoming complacent because they are comfortable with the method they've been using to obtain leads and don't want to step outside their comfort zone. What happens then is that your business stalls and you begin to loose potential business.

Have you ever considered getting some new insurance leads from individuals that are already your clients? Maybe they currently purchase health insurance from you. Why not give them a call and see if they also need home insurance. Perhaps you can tantalize them with a discount for combining policies. You could also ask existing clients for references to friends and family that might be in the market for home insurance insurance. You could do some telephone cold calls. There are actually many places that you can find home insurance leads.

If you are looking for a steady flow of fresh quality premuim insurance leads you should consider Veretekk as a lead generating. This service is mistakenly overlooked by many business owners, and yet when configured properly it has the ability to allow your agency to grow successfully.

This is a little bit about Veretekk and the benefits it offers. If you are not currently experiencing growth in your business it is definitely worth looking into Veretekk.

Signup for a free silver account at Veretekk today!

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ19

Buying leads can become very expensive. Leads can cost up to $10 per leads. Most leads are already resold. When you purchase leads you will very rarely get a good prospect from those leads. Buying leads will cause you to lose a lot of money and time. Leads companies are in the business of making money. Ever wonder why you come up against a massive number of rejections cold calling them? Buying Leads are Useless!

Get the facts before you buy mlm leads. There are some lead companies out there that are very reputable and even offer mlm lead training when you buy their leads. However, just because a company does not offer lead training doesn't mean they are not a reputable company. If you need mlm lead training there are plenty of places on the internet that offer this service free of charge and they are easy to find. Don't get taken to the cleaners. Do your homework, and Stop Buying Leads!!!

I Did My Homework - I Decided to Buy Customers

If you could buy a paying customer for the same price as a quality lead what would you do? Enter Its Good Business. By following our exclusive Its Good Business business plan, you only buy customers to build your home based business. Its Good Business is committed to teaching you a better way to operate an online business. We are here to show you the path to financial freedom the slow and proven way.

Come and listen to the most innovative and income producing system known on Google today. All that you really have to do is to write a check every month. These customers that you are buying are already buying, and loving, the product. The result? You make money from their purchases. In other words, the more customers that you buy, the more money that you make. For more information contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Veretekk the Master Tool for Internet Marketers

It's amazing to me when I see people who think they can come online and have instant success without rolling up their sleeves and doing the work required to success. There is so much garbage out there that will sell you on instant success and don't deliver on the promise's.

Veretekk is so different...

#1 Veretekk doesn't charge you one red cent to take a look and see if their marketing system tools are for you.

#2 Veretekk has many live online trainings that teach you many different ways to market online. It's up to you to choose which way or who you want to follow and learn from.

#3 Every week the Veretekk CEO gives you live updates on what is happening in the system, what's to come, and what is changing. As a gold member in Veretekk they just keep adding more and more value.

I don't know about you... but if I had a choice between some ebook or collection of CD's teaching internet marketing vs live tools that actually work and do what their suppose to do I know what I would choose.

When I look back over the years since I was first introduced to Veretekk and what I've learned from the live online trainings. I wouldn't be anywhere close to the marketer I am today without Veretekk. I've lost count how may site's I've driven to the top of the search engines using the Veretekk tools.

If you are serious about your business and plan to be around for the long haul Veretekk is where you should be. All I can say is get plugged into this system and stick with it and you will succeed.

For more information contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ19

Buying leads from the lead companies is a way for building a leads list, but you must be very careful. Most leads lists out there are repeatedly bought and sold online over and over again and can end up draining your bank account. This is why most marketers prefer to learn how to generate their own leads rather than buying leads. Most of the time with purchased leads, the marketer will try to call the people on the leads list and they find that the leads don’t even want to talk to him/her because they’re probably the hundredth internet marketer who’s called them.

If you're an Internet Marketer and are still out there paying for leads then you are not a successful marketer. Imagine having the ability to produce free premium leads, and never having to buy leads again? Many marketers uses Veretekk to generate their own leads. Veretekk also offerss others the use of free marketing tools to build a home business. Veretekk is all about building a relationship between a marketer and their leads. It shows others that you really are interested in helping them become successful. Building a leads list does not cost anything but time.

I only use the Veretekk System to generate business builders that want to work on the internet. Not only is Veretekk generating lots of leads, but they are high quality premuim leads. If you like to learn more about building a successful business without buying leads visit It's Good Business or contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Survive the Changing Job Market

Housing market collapse, Major corporations bankrupt, Bank failure and tumbling stock markets have people concerned for their present and future job security. That is the bad news permeating the media however what is not mentioned is there is hope and prosperity in these uncertain times.

The US economy is reeling from a housing-led slowdown, Unemployment is rapidly approaching double digits and some people convinced we are already already in a deep recession. People used to be secure in the knowledge that their jobs were secure and their healthcare and pensions would remain safe and in place.

Not so today, crushing stock market losses, home foreclosures,companies merging with each other and some of those Wall Street money grubbers stripping off assets, causing many people to lose their jobs, while the CEO's open their golden parachutes and retire to safety.

No one ever plans to get laid off or lose everything they have worked so hard for but it is now happening at an alarming rate. No one is safe. As much as we plan in life for (weddings, the birth of our children, our children’s education, health care costs, vacationing, even our own deaths), it’s surprising how few people plan for just such a situation as losing their job.

Accprding to a recent government survey more than one third Iof the population is adequately prepared for retirement. Imagine waking up one morning, commuting to the job you held for the last 15 years only to find that your department has downsized and your employment has been terminated leaving you without a way to earn a living and without health coverage and stability for your family.

What will YOU do without a back-up plan?

Record numbers of people are turning to the Internet to supplement their shrinking incomes. The problem is that until now the failure rate has been unacceptable for a variety of reasons.

Unrealistic Goals - Hype has given unrealistic expectations to those seeking to build businesses on the Internet.

Lack of Education - Creating a business on the Internet is like landing in a foreign county with no idea of the customs or how to speak the language.

The solution can be found by visiting It's Good Business which is a home based business opportunity offering live training by certified trainers to start a legitimate Internet business with an established base of real customers that assures your success.

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ18

Veretekk have been supplying top quality premium leads, most every kind of lead, including home based business opportunities leads for years. We even have Health Leads, which if you are building a home business that is into insurance leads, you should think about obtaining a Free Veretekk Silver System.

Leads are very popular for anyone building a home based business. Leads these days and so are health insurance leads, range anywhere from $10 to $20 per lead. Who can afford these outrages prices when 95% of the leads have already been sold two or three times to other home business owners.

Generating free leads is for your home businesses is what Veretekk are all about. If its insurance leads, home based business opportunities leads, mortage leads, or weight loss leads, Veretekk can generate them.

Veretekk have been in this business for many years now. Over time Veretekk have amassed a wide range of proven marketing tools and services which will help you build your business and help you reach your goals.

Overall, Veretekk will keep a steady flow of leads for for business. But if you configure a Veretekk system properly plan and know what you are doing, you will be able to avoid running out of leads. Personally I used Veretekk to generate free leads and promote my primary Trivita business. If you like to know more on how to build a successful business contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ17

Insurance agents that uses Veretekk marketing system receive more home, business, health insurance leads and insurance leads than with any other insurance lead service. Veretekk, as the Internet’s most popular marketing service on Google, provide insurance agents a consistent volume of high quality premium leads for insurance. Stop cold calling and let Veretekk deliver you targeted insurance leads.

Thousands of insurance agents have decided to choose Veretekk. By only targeting consumers who are actively shopping for insurance, Veretekk can generate free insurance leads for all types of leads.

In today’s world, many people go to world wide web for their information and, increasingly, to shop for both products and services. Insurance is no different. So if you want to get the leads that are actively looking for insurance, you need to be a part of Veretekk. Not only is Veretekk the best marketing service on Google, but The Veretekk Lead Generating System has been described as the most revolutionary home based business asset available on the Internet today. You can get leads for whatever type of insurance business you are in.

Want to know how to grow your business with the power Veretekk contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Home Based Business Opportunity CJ 14

All around the world, people who want more control over their lives are starting home based businesses. Part of getting a good start is choosing the right home based business opportunity. A person has to choose a home based opportunity which interests them. They should be able to easily form the determination and drive to make their home based business successful. It also helps to choose wisely. An opportunity should be well set up. It should be easy to start up new people and to both learn and teach the system.

Another way to get a good start when choosing a home business is establishing a good solid team. A successful home based business is all about building a downline that works hard and in return your downline builds a team and teaches the same techniques. If a persons team is not making money then they are not making money - that is the bottom line. A person should choose their team members carefully. I always look for Go Getters, people that are serious, and that are teachable. Many times people simply let anyone who contacts them become part of their team. This is not the way to do it. They should conduct an interview and explain the opportunity to the person. They should make absolutely sure that the person is willing to put forth a good effort to be successful. A well chosen team goes a long way to making a person successful.

It is easy to get discourage, because it take time to build a good successful business. Success doesn't happen overnight. But there is a team called Yes,Its Good Business that allows you to have success with a home based business. My team has teamed up with Trivita where we teaches you to have twenty-five customers for your business the same day you start. If you like to like more contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Insurance leads CJ16

Many insurance companies encourages agents to buy insurance leads. Many agents use leads, thinking this is the best way for writing more policies and making them successful. Then the new agents thinks, when I buy more leads I will be able to generate more customers and my business will really bloom.

Insurance agents new to industry are sometimes hesitant to take a dive and start their first campaign. They've been hearing a lot about insurance leads,and after awhile it starts sounding an awful lot like hype.

Are leads really an important strategy for agents looking to grow their business? There are a lot of top agents who'll tell you it is.

If you want to get customers and build your business the right way, it is important to consider the benefits of Veretekk and Trivita Business Model for a home based business. Either of these methods will expose and build your business from day one.

For more information on how to build a business with customers that are already purchasing products visit Yes, It's Good business or contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ15

Todays insurance market, insurance leads are a must. An insurance lead connects a person selling insurance to a consumer who wants to find out more information about a certain type of insurance.

Buying insurance leads can cut down on the time and money spent finding potential clients, and maximize insurance sales. Finding credible leads is tricky, but it can give you an advantage over the competition if youre selling insurance in this highly competitive market.

You can get your insurance leads from two main source, through a lead company or by generating your own. Most insurance leads that are being sold over the internet are non-exclusive leads. Meaning the leads are usually sent to three or more insurance agents. Though this type of lead is more cost effective, it isn't confidential and often takes longer to get a hold of the leads, which increases the chances that your lead is no longer a premuim lead.

Buying insurance leads can help you get in touch with consumers quickly, but its not a good way to build a business

Team up with Trivita and Yes, It's Good Business

TriVita and Yes It's Good Business has provided a home business opportunity whereby a person of average means and modest business skills can realize the American Dream of owning their own business. Trivita's cooperative marketing business model where you can purchase Trivita's current customers. Customers that Trivita has acquired through their multi-media marketing campaigns.

As Business Affiliates, Yes It's Good Business members acquire customers through Trivita's unique Media Acquisition Program, and receive commission on their life-time, monthly product purchases. TriVita brings in thousands of new customers every month through their television, radio, print and Internet marketing efforts. These are real customers and you don’t have to process their orders. IN FACT, YOU DO NOT SELL, STOCK OR SHIP PRODUCT! You may call, write or email them after they are placed in you downline if you want to.

We have researched and found the viable tools to build a successful home based business on Google with help of Veretekk, Trivita. To learn more visit Yes, Its Good Business or contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Home Based Business Opportunity CJ 13

The way the economy is now alot of people might be thinking of a home based business oportunity so you can earn an income while staying home with your children. There are many wonderful home based business opportunities and success stories associated with home businesses, but there are also many scams and fraudulent schemes out there, as well.

You have probably seen websites for easy money from home. Many businesses promise thousands of dollars a month in profit for working from home. However, they also rarely give any details about what you would be doing with some of these businesses. So what will you do with all the options for working from home? How will you tell which ones are for real and which ones are scams? It can be difficult to figure this out.

Many businesses that are trying to rip you off are quite tricky when it comes to hiding what they are actually doing. There is a good chance, however, that if they are not up front about what you would be doing at home that you should not look into it. A lack of honesty in the advertisement is a dead give away that this home based business oportunity is not a good one. However, there are lots of other businesses that appear legitimate and are not. So while there is no sure way to find out if a home based business is legitimate, there are some businesses that are.

With so many online businesses, it can be hard to tell which are legitimate and which use unethical online business practices.

We have taken a great deal of time on home business research to find the resources, tools and information you need to begin the process but to manage it successfully. If you are searching for ways to start a home business research Yes It's Good Business on Google. For more information on how to create a no stress homw business contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Home Baesd Business CJ12

Your home based business success will hinge on many key components, however developing customer loyalty should be your first priority of any home based business opportunity plan. It’s easy to talk about developing customer loyalty; actually implementing a plan for customer retention is quite another matter. It's importance should not be excluded from your overall business plan. Your reliability, credibility and dedication to your customer’s needs cannot be overlooked. Successful business’s practice it everyday and insist upon it in their employees. Customer loyalty matters.

During these hard economic times, people are more selective on where they spend their money. When they do decide to open their wallets or checksbooks, you want to be their first choice. Therefore, it's important your current customers choose to stay with you. Even if your business is doing well, your customers can leave as quickly as they came. Building a relationship helps you establish a bond. Some customers are even willing to pay more for a product and or service if they have a personal connection with a person they are buying from. From a my point of view, building relationships is cost-effective because the only cost is your time.

You should always inquire with your customers from time to time with regard to how your home based business is doing overall. Ask your customers if there is anything you should consider changing to make your business more favorable to their needs. This is another way to really build a good relationship with your customers and keep them coming back for more time and time again.

We have taken a great deal of time to find the resources, tools and information you need to build a stress free home based business with paying customers. For more information contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ14

It is not necessary to buy insurance leads or any type of leads in this day and age. Veretekk is a great way for you to generate your own leads. While lead companies many charge anywhere from five to ten dollars per lead, there are some techniques and tools for you to take advantage of that will enable you to never buy insurance leads again. The first secret to never buying leads is to make your self known on the Internet with Veretekk. One of the best ways for getting yourself known is taking advantage of the power of Veretekk. By getting your name out there your business will naturally start attracting customers who are in need of your services.

Trivita and Yes It's Good Business help you get customers

Everyone knows that business is about customers,and that the customer is king. However, for most entrepreneurs, acquiring and servicing customers is very difficult and challenging. In fact most businesses fail because they can’t find and keep enough customers. But with a TriVita Wellness business, you won’t have to worry about a tough problem like this. For almost a decade now, Trivita and Yes It's Good Business have pioneered a completely new business model that was specifically designed for the small business entrepreneur. It’s our exclusive Cooperative Marketing model, and it’s been proven to be a viable business model that brings success to even the most average individual.

Personally I used Veretekk to generate leads and promote my primary Trivita business buying customers. If you like to know more on how to build a successful business with customers, visit Yes It's Good Business or contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ13

You could sign over a big chunk of your marketing budget to some fly-by-night lead company that takes your money and vanishes. Or you could partner with Yes It's Good Business — where a team of successful marketers teach you how to build a business with paying customers not leads.

Yes, It's Good Business Team can set you up with a steady supply of customers that already buying the product. Giving you the opportunity to start making money from day one. More customers and more commissions in your pocket. Our cooperative marketing program brings you real people already purchasing real products. And you get it delivered right to your computer in real time.

We know how the lead companies operate — they take your money, dump a bunch of stale leads in your lap, and then vanish into thin air when you ask for credit. Yes It's Good Business doesn't work like that. When you partner with us, Trivita and Google, you only get customers that are already buying.

If you would like more information on how my team and I build our business with customers not leads visit Yes It's Good Business or contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Homw Business CJ11

A homw business is one of the few smart businesses to start in these troubled times. Even if sales have slowed down, most homw businesses continue to thrive and have even posted growth despite the bad economy. This is a probable indication that a homw business is the future of business.

If you are someone who is planning to start a homw business, then this is the most perfect time to finally begin one. As prices of basic commodities increase, it is estimated that more and more individuals will opt to work from home and start a homw business. Now that job security is a thing of the past, all the more reason that you should start working for yourself by starting your own homw business. Are you still planning for your retirement check when you reach sixty-five? With the current economy, you will be lucky if you still have your job in the next few years. So why not take control of your life now and secure your future by starting a homw business.

We have taken a great deal of time on homw business research to find the resources, tools and information you need to begin the process but to manage it successfully. If you are searching for ways to start a homw business research Yes It's Good Business on Google. For more information on how to create a no stress homw business contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ12

Buying insurance leads from lead companies is a way for building a leads list, but be very careful. Most leads lists out there are bought and sold over and over again and can end up costing a pretty penny for marketing an online business. This is why most insurance agents prefer to learn how to generate their own leads rather than buying leads. Most of the time with purchased leads, the agent will try to call the people on the list and they find that the leads don’t even want to talk to him/her about no insurance policy.

The biggest disadvantage of buying leads from lead companies is that you may be breaking the law by using them. If you send messages to people who you have not had any contact with before, chances are that you are breaking the law and sending spam. There are heavy fines and possible prison sentences for committing this crime.

Whether building leads or buying leads, it is important for an agent to really educate themselves about the advantages and disadvantages.

How much money have you spent, or are you willing to spend, on building your insurance business? Hundreds, or perhaps even thousands of dollars? Before you spend a dime on worthless insurance leads, why not take a look at buying customers instead of leads. Customers that are already buying products. Yes folks, there is a way to buy customers and not leads.

I don’t buy insurance leads. I buy customers. I don’t have to make any calls. I don’t get rejected. I do not have good telemarketing skills. I don’t need them. And when I buy customers, they appear in my downline with out any effort on my part. If you would like more information how how to build a business with customers visit Yes It's Good Business or contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ11

Should you just buy your insurance leads? A lot of people will tell you that you should, simply b ecause it’s very convenient. Gathering leads can definitely take you a lot of time. First you need to determine how you can get these leads, set up a website, or create an opt-in list. Then you may have to market your business to attract more prospects. You may be getting insurance leads, but it’s not going to be as many as the ones you can obtain when you simply buy them.

How You Buy Insurance Leads

The best way to buy insurance leads is to go online. There are plenty of lead companies out there, so you won’t have a problem looking for one. They already have the technology in place that will help them gather leads that are not interested in the insurance policies that you’re currently sellin g. When these leads are already gathered, they will be passed on to you and other agents. Nurturing and keeping track of them will then be your sole responsibility. Screening the Lead Company Sounds so easy? It is, but then you also have to think about the quality of the leads that are being generated. A number of these companies are certified failures in this department. After all, their goal is to get as many leads as possible for their clients. If you want to buy your insurance leads, you need to ma ke sure that you’re dealing with the best lead-generation oompany. Here are some questions you'll want to consider before making a decision.

Does the lead provider protect against agents from the same company getting the same lead? For example, will two or three agents get the same lead? Most lead companies don't offer this protection.

Does the lead company require you to purchase a minimum amount of leads? The bottom line is, the leads should speak for themselves. The amount of leads should be up to you. If the company requires a minimum of 50 leads at one time, that's fair. That many at one time should throw up a red flag. A good rule of thumb is to try 10 leads before making a decision about the quality of the lead source

How much do the leads cost? Obviously, cost is a major factor when entering into a relationship with any insurance lead company. Compare lead costs as a factor, but don't let this be all that you focus on. Most health leads cost in between $5 to $10 dollars a piece.

Yes It's good Business to Buy Customers

That’s right; buy customers, not leads. I buy customers. What is a customer? Individuals or households that purchase goods and services…”? There you have the secret to success; buy individuals that are spending money, and doing it month after month after month.

I don’t waste my time trying to turn a lead into a customer. I don’t keep calling so-called “phone insurance leads” that cost me five to ten dollars, and try to turn him or her into a customer. I buy customers! Plain and simple, I BUY CUSTOMERS!

If you would like to know how I build my business with paying customers visit Yes It's Good Business or contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887

(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ10

Getting good leads are every company main focus for success of any business as it attracts more customers. Good quality leads has helped the businesses to increase more sales. There are various methods through which one may get good insurance leads. Internet is playing a major role in success of many businesses. To compete with the competitors in the market business owners are using Veretekk as a weapon. Veretekk has moved all the geographical barriers and has played an important role in getting good premuim leads with various methods in creative ways.

One of the best methods of targeting large quantity of insurance leads and converting them into customers can be done with the help of a Veretekk marketing system.

So, what is Veretekk and how does it work? Simply put, Veretekk is a comprehensive marketing system that has multiple capabilities, resources and tools. It contains built-in SEO (search engine optimization) tools to get your company pushed to the top of search engine results based on the keywords you target. It also gives you the ability to generate heath leads, insurance leads, and insurance leads for health for your business and automatically grows a spam-free database of email addresses for you to market to. Why buy leads when you can generate qualified premuim leads with Veretekk.

If you would like to see how I use Veretekkk to generate premuim insurance leads and turn them into paying customer visit me at Yes It's Good Business or contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ9

Insurance leads, provided in real-time, when you need them. Increase your sales without sacrificing quality. Health insurance leads, insurance leads for health, and health leads leads are Veretekk specialty. High quality leads that are the product of years of research and industry experience are what you need to increase your insurance sales.

Veretekk is the product of years of research and development for the ultimate insurance lead generation system Google. Veretekk mission is to produce quality free leads for insurance agents who desire excellent conversions on their insurance sales. Veretekk redefine the meaning of affordability, all while building long-lasting, dependable relationships. Agents who already utilize Veretekk rely on their leads to grow their business.

Thousands of insurance agents across the country turn to Veretekk for exceptional insurance leads. Get the leads that convert to quality customers. In the insurance industry, retention is critical, and this is why the CEO of Veretekk developed a system that ensures we arm you with the best quality leads, to help you grow your agencies.

As an Veretekk member, you will have an unparalleled opportunity to take advantage of the high quality leads that you produce. Each day, we strive to produce new tools to help you grow your agency more efficiently. Start receiving insurance leads today!

I personally uses Veretekk to generate fresh premuim leads for my primary business and turn them into paying customers. If you would like to see how I use customers to build my business from the start visit me at Yes It's Good Business or contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Web Conferencing Solutions

For most people in business, meetings are a necessary. Stop for a moment and consider how much hosting or attending meetings cost your business and you may be in for a surprise precious time spent traveling to and from the meeting location, travel expenses, and in some cases the hire of the meeting facility. Now imagine you could attend that meeting without having to leave your office or home. How much time and money would save over a week, a month or a year?

As we all know we can use our computers for many thing these days, Web Conferencing rooms are becoming the preferred method of communication in the Internet world. Travelling becomes very expensive and the risks has increased, this technology makes it possible to conduct meetings with full audio-visual interaction from the safety and comfort of your office or ho

Web Conferencing Solutions

One of the many ways the Internet is changing the face of homw business owners is through its ability to bring customers, vendors, employees and prospects closer together regardless of where they may be in the world.

You are obviously familiar with the concept of telephone "conference calls", a widely used technology for many years that allows people in different locations to share in the same phone call. While undoubtedly useful, participants in a phone conference call can only hear each other and they can't view a presenter's slides or notes, nor give feedback or really take advantage of the benefits of a face-to-face meeting. Web Conferencing changes that by allowing conference participants to not only speak to and hear each other, but also share notes, view multimedia presentations, even work through ideas on a screencast or white board.

Web conferencing is great for general meetings, sales presentations, training, brainstorming sessions and more! Thousands of businesses are already taking advantage of Web conferencing to reduce travel expenses, increase productivity and offer their employees more work flexibility. Compare that to a telephone call and the advantages of Web conferencing become clear as a bell.

Whether you have family, friends, organizations, partners or customers in your local neighborhood or spread around the world, Vereconference allows you to communicate seamlessly, saves you the cost of the phone calls and gives you tremendous advantages to communicate both verbally and visually.

If you would like to know how Vereconference will improve your homw business, company meeting, or business presentations visit me at Yes It Good Business

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ8

As an agent what could be the best possible way to continue to generate health insurance leads? Yes, you can buy prequalified health leads that are are at more likely to be sold to other insurance agents. But is there a smarter method by which an agent could reach out to potential customers, without intruding on those consumers who may not have a need for his services? There is much that can be done in order to generate health and group health insurance leads. The internet such as Google provides the agent with a fantastic opportunity to reach new prospects daily.

Do you want to generate Insurance Leads

An agent can easily generate leads successfully on your own. You can succeed at generating leads locally and nationally on the internet. Even internationally.

The number one secret to generating insurance leads , is to have a marketing system. I have seen lots of agents turn to Veretekk for all there marketing needs. There are other ways to generate internet life insurance leads, but if you really want to get a steady flow of internet insurance leads, you should focus on a obtaining a Free Veretekk Silver System.

First of all Veretekk is a lead generation system allows you to build up more traffic for your insurance business using their marketing portals. One portal that it offers lets agents download 2,000 leads for free.

You can use Veretekk to promote your own insurance business as well as you can use it as a business opportunity for other insurance agents. You can make the service available to them for their business leads as well as an opportunity for them to make money too.

They offer auto responders which are an excellent way to follow up with insurance leads and develop relationships with them. The Internet can be kind of impersonal and future follow-up is one of the most important things you can do to build your business.

Therefore Veretekk is not only supplying you with the leads, but also giving you an auto responder to follow-up with them. If you currently have an autoresponder, you can redirect any leads you get from the Veretekk opportunity directly into it as well.

There is not an Insurance agent today doesn't need more leads! Regardless of how experienced you are there something with this system that can benefit you.

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ7

Insurance Leads for Health

As an insurance agent, if you run out of insurance leads for health your business is going to be in trouble. This means that you will be in a position where you don’t have any health leads to call. And as you can imagine, this is never a good thing for a insurance agent. You want to make sure that you always have enough insurance leads to stay busy. This holds true no matter if you have to market for health leads, or purchase them. Either way, more insurance leads are always better.

If you find yourself running out of insurance leads the first thing that you should do is learn how to start generating free leads for your business. This will give you information on how to get back on track and generate fresh premuim leads your business is seeking.. Are you going to start cold calling potential prospects? Are you going to put your face and contact information on a billboard? What about generating insurance leads with a Veretekk marketing System? A Veretekk marketing system will help you get qualified leads that are waiting for you to call with insurance quotes.

Before you completely run out of leads, you should start generating for more insurance leads for health. This helps to ensure that you never get to a point where you are stuck with nobody to call on.

Overall, Veretekk will keep a steady flow of leads for for insurance agents. But if you configure a Veretekk system properly plan and know what you are doing, you will be able to avoid running out of insurance leads for health entirely. In the long run, the most successful agents are those who always have leads available and more coming in on a regular basis.

Personally I used Veretekk to generate free leads and promote my primary business buying customers. If you like to know more on how to build a successful business with customers, contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Starting a Homw Business during a Reccession

Starting a Homw business during a Reccession

Should you start a homw business during a recession? This is a question that many entrepreneurs have been trying to get answered. With the state of the economy and consumer confidence at record low, this is the best time to invest time and money into a business? A homw business is highly recommended.

An online homw businesses stand a greater chance of succeeding than any offline business. You don’t have to put off your entrepreneurial dreams, in fact now’s the time to get in the game. There are several reasons why you should consider working from home.

For starters you are dealing with a global market. Just because your country is facing an economic meltdown doesn’t mean everyone is. When you operate an online business the world is literally at your fingertip which means you can easily get products and services to people who live miles from you or over the internet.

By doing some research you can tap into a market that is not struggling as much, and offer items they would be familiar with at lower prices.

Starting a homw business also costs a lot less than what people think business. The costs of renting space alone are staggering these days. However, to get started all you need is an internet connection, a computer, and a phone line.And like most households those items are already supplied. Once you found the perfect homw business and invest in an Veretekk marketing system you can start promoting your homw business products or service within your niche.

We have taken a great deal of time on homw business research to find the resources, tools and information you need to begin the process but to manage it successfully. If you are searching for ways to start a homw business research Trivita on Google. For more information on how to create a no stress homw business contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ6

Being a health insurance agent is not an easy job. You can spend the whole day talking to prospects, but the end result could be frustrating, especially if your customer rejects you. Even if you are able to explain the value of your product and be better than any other agent trying to earn that prospect’s business, it might not be enough to make a sale at the end of the day. You have to know the people who are in need of health insurance. But what if you don't know how to generate insurance leads? You are therefore left with one choice, and that is to have buy health insurance leads.

Health insurance leads are steady stream of prospects that you can generate for free. Usually, health insurance leads are sold over and over to other agents on an exclusive basis and are never real-time customers looking for what you're offering. If you are an insurance agent, you can generate leads with a Veretekk system that are ready to purchased. These referrals now become your free health insurance leads. These prospects are interested enough to search the Internet for an insurance quote, and as an agent, it is your responsibility to make certain that they get one from you.

Buying insurancs leads is very expensive and can quickly put you in deep debt - be careful. I do not recommend that you buy leads to build your insurance business.

I want to share with you step by step how I built my business with real customers, not leads. If you would like to know how an average guy like me can build a real homw business online without any special technical skills.. Visit Yes, Its Good Business or Just ask:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ5

Aren't you tired of buying insurance leads from vendors where the customer goes to their website thinking they are going to get an online quote and are trapped into completing a form before they know what they're even doing? You call the potential client and they either don't answer the phone or they have no idea they even requested it. If you do reach them, you find out the lead was called by 5 or 10 other agents.

Generating health insurance leads is a process that many insurance agents struggle with on a regular basis. Some agents choose to buy these leads while others attempt to build their own database of insurance leads. Whatever you decide to do, buy your health insurance leads or create your own, there is going to be a right and wrong way to make these things happen. Buying insurance leads is practically the wrong way. Using a little common sense will help make the health insurance leads generation process go smoothly.

If you choose to buy your health insurance leads, you should know that the average price per lead is usually $5-$10. Now buying one or one hundred health insurance leads does not mean you will end up with customers. It merely means that you will pay for names of people who are considering or are interested in purchasing health insurance.

Of course, generating your own health insurance leads can be done without buying them. In fact most insurance agents are generating leads thru Veretekk marketing system. These leads are funneled to the subscriber's Marketing Center where they learn all of the advantages of what you are promoting and are encouranged to sign-up to become a distributor in your business. The Marketing Center is linked directly to your business' insurance web site.

Personally I used Veretekk to generate leads and promote my primary business buying customers. If you like to know more on how to build a successful business with customers, please come join Corie Wallace and C.J.Roberson at http://yes.itsgoodbusiness.net:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Homw Business CJ10

Veretekk Tracks your Advertising Campaigns

Many homw business opportunities do not have a feature in which you can track your advertising campaigns. Veretracking contained in a free Veretekk system help you see where your time and money should be going towards when marketing your homw business. Veretracking shows the visitors IP address is, what browser they are using, how long they visited and shows this data in real time, as well as in easy to read bar graphs. Veretracking also makes a code for you in your free marketing system, to use in any HTML email you send or web page you build anywhere on the Internet. This feature alone sells for $50 - $100 per month on the Internet.

If you do not have access to a comprehensive back office there is no way to track your advertising. You can simply ask your leads how they found out about you. But it will be much easier if you had your very own Veretracking system to track your campaigns. Remember time is money, so channel your efforts in terms of advertising to those options that have proved successful in the past.

For more information on how to grow your homw business stress free, join Corie Wallace on Wednesday nights 10pm ESt and Saturdays 4pm EST as she gives her presentation at YIGB, http://yes.itsgoodbusiness.net:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ4

Premium Insurance Leads

Thousands of insurance agents across the country turn to Veretekk for exceptional insurance leads. Generate your own leads and convert to quality customers. In the insurance industry, retention is critical, and this is why we've developed a system that ensures we arm you with the best premium leads, to help you grow your agencies.

As an Veretekk member, you will have an unparalleled opportunity to take advantage of the high quality insurance leads that you need. Each day, Veretekk strive to produce new tools to help you grow your agency more efficiently. Start receiving insurance leads today!

We have taken a great deal of time to find the resources, tools and information you need to build a stress free business with paying customers. For more information contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Homw Business CJ9

Homw Business Leads

The key to success in any homw business is to keep costs down, and maximize your return from every advertising dollar you spend. Most marketers spend most of their hard earned money on leads and advertising, undermining their own profit potential. Why not generate your leads from a Veretekk system that guarantees the quality of it's leads and offers you a chance to earn additional income ?

The homw business leads that the Veretekk system generates aren't sold over and over again. These are fresh, premiumm leads, with name, physical contact information, and confirmed email address, collected from people who want what you are promoting.

Why buy leads that have been sold over and over again, when you can have the highest quality premium leads on the market AND build another income stream in the process?

In addition to this amazing opportunity to generate your own leads and develop another income stream, you also have access to some first-class live training from certified Veretekk trainers who have succeeded in mlm and network marketing, both offline and online. What could be more valuable than to look over the shoulder of someone who has been there and done that?

While your Veretekk system is generating leads for your homw business, I would like you to consider investigating new ways to make serious money by simply following the Its Good Business model. For more information contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Homw Business CJ8

Veretekk - Free Leads

One of the first places you can generate leads for your homw business of course, is to your friends and family. You can also make a list of everyone you know. You’ll likely be surprised by how long that list is, and the people you know are a good place to start looking for homw business partners. When buying leads for your homw business opportunity, you want to be sure you’re getting them from a reputable company. You don’t want to buy an out of date leads list or one that’s been sold over and over. So do some research on the list selling company before you buy.

If you've ever bought leads, you know the agony of spending your hard earned paycheck on prospects that have no clue who you are, have no interest in learning about your business, and have no intention of joining your homw business opportunity.

Generate Fresh Leads with Veretekk

. . .you can dominate the search engines and generate tons of free targeted leads for your business.

The Veretekk Lead Generating System has been described as the most revolutionary homw business asset available on the Internet today. This Veretekk system along with the groudbreaking features included with the Veretekk system, will add a powerful component to your existing business. You will never have to pay for a lead again.

While your Veretekk system is generating leads for your homw business, I would like you to consider investigating new ways to make serious money by simply following the Its Good Business model. For more information contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Homw Business CJ7

Considering A Homw Business

To most people going to work meant traveling from home to a plant or office. Today many people do some or all of their work at home. Nowadays people start their own homw business and work from the comfort of their house.

Many people find that starting a work at homw business is an ideal arrangement and decide to formally set up businesses there. The Small Business Administration estimates that more than 3 million homw businesses are now operating throughout the country.

Every day, people are striking out and achieving economic and creative independence by turning their skills into dollars. Living rooms, kitchens, bedrooms and even garages are being turned into the homw business headquarters of the new homw business people. And with recent technological advances and a rising demand for "service-oriented" businesses, the opportunities seem to be endless.

Choosing a homw business you much approach it with a great deal of care. You need to learn as much about the market for any product or service as you can, before you invest your time, effort, and money. Before you dive head first into a homw business, it's essential that you know why you are doing it and how you will do it.

We have taken a great deal of time on homw business research to find the resources, tools and information you need to begin the process but to manage it successfully. If you are searching for ways to promote or start a homw business research Veretekk and Trivita on Google. For more information on how to create a no stress homw business contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Homw Business Goals CJ6

Homw Business Goals

If there was one thing that you could do that would ensure success with your homw business more than any other one thing, would you do it. Goal setting is a cornerstone of success in any business. Many people think that their homw business goals are ‘make lots of money’ or ‘get a nice car’ or buy . In fact they’re wrong. Their goals are to build up the business to such a level where this is possible: money, cars and material wealth must always be second to a successful business.

Reasons for starting your own homw business are different to the goals you have while starting them. Reasons will probably include cutting down the commute, getting away from a dead beat job, and making more time for you and your family. For all reasons, but again they are ultimately predicated with the need to be successful in your homw business.

Work hard at your homw business and you will meet your goals and plans for the future. Without hard work, goals and plans are nothing at all.

If you are searching for ways to help you with your homw business goals research It's Good Business on Google. For more information on how to create a no stress homw business contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Homw Business CJ5

Generating Leads

Now you can have the opportunity to generate your own high quality homw business leads while you are also promoting a homw business opportunity that will train your downline for you, and can produce substantial residual income over the long term.

When you generate these premuim homw business leads and prospects you'll also have the opportunity to get first-rate training from some serious heavy hitters in the field of internet marketing. Further, as a member of Veretekk, you can earn commissions when your downline in your primary business joins the leads consortium. That's "win/win" for you and your recruits, and everybody has the chance to add a second income stream while reaping the benefits of these qualified homw business leads and prospects.

The key to success in any business is to keep costs down, and maximize your return from every advertising dollar you spend. Most network marketers spend a fortune on leads and advertising, undermining their own profit potential. Why not generate your leads with a Veretekk system that guarantees the quality of its leads and offers you a chance to earn additional income ?

For more information on how to promote your homw business on Google with a Veretekk system contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Homw Business CJ4

Homw Business Residual Income

Today, with the internet, there is a homw business opportunity for anyone that is willing to do a little research. Despite what you may have heard from your friends and family, there are truly people around the world who are generating thousands of extra dollars each month by taking advantage of these homw business opportunities. At this point, you may be asking yourself what residual income means.

The best homw businesses are those that pay you over and over again for doing something one time. For example, assume you run a website where you give SEO tips through articles. You charge people $10 a month to be a member of your site. That homw business can generate residual income for you even though you are only writing each article once. Imagine having 1,000 members of your website, each paying $10 every month! There are thousands of homw business opportunities like this that can generate residual income for you.

As with anything new, you need to spend a little time doing research before you start homw business. Because there are tons of great business opportunities available, you need to find the one that best suits you and one that is not a scam.

You may need to spend a little money to take advantage of some of these homw business opportunities. Remember, some of the most profitable homw businesses available require a small fee. But, when compared to the potential residual income that the business can generate for you and your family each month, the small fee is hardly worth worrying about.

We have taken a great deal of time on homw business research to find the resources, tools and information you need to begin the process but to manage it successfully. If you are searching for ways to earn extra money research Trivita on Google. For more information on how to create a no stress homw business contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Homw Business CJ3

Advertising Your Homw Business

Is it a smart move to pay for leads for your homw business, or should you rely on leads that comes from your own advertising efforts over time?

Every business needs customers, without them you would not have anyone to sell your products or services to. In the internet world traffic is the walk in customer. The more leads you have the more people you would be able to sell your products to.

If you are looking to get quick results with minimal effort on your part,probably the best way to achieve this would be to sign up for a free silver Veretekk marketing system. However,the exciting thing with this strategy is that once you configured your Veretekk system the leads start flowing in for your homw business.

If you are not paying for leads with money,you are going to pay for it with time you put into advertising your homw business with Veretekk. The best way for generating free leads is to use Veretekk. This is clearly a short term strategy that produces results over time.

For more information on how to create a stress homw business contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Homw Business CJ2

Homw Business Startup

A new homw business will likely need some new equipment. At the very least you will need a desk of some description, a computer and a phone. While it might be tempting to go out and spend as little as possible on each of these items it should be remembered that these purchases are an investment into your homw business.

If you are planning on spending a lot of time on the phone with your homw business then get a good quality headset – Plantronics are excellent in this area – and consider a wireless version if you think you might benefit from moving around while on the phone. A good computer will save you and your homw business a lot of time a stress; a reliable computer will save you even more.

We have taken a great deal of time on homw business research to find the resources, tools and information you need to begin the process but to manage it successfully. For more information on how to create a no stress homw business contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Homw Business CJ1

Homw Business Defined

A homw business is, not surprisingly, a business based in your homw. Whether you do all the work in your home or on customers’ or third-party premises, whether you run a franchise, a direct-sales operation, or a business opportunity, if the center of your operations is based in your home, it’s a homw business.

Reasons to start a Homw Business

Starting a homw business online means you have a continuously growing market as more and more people come online everyday. You want to escape the rat race. You’d rather spend the 2 hours you waste every day with your family, or on a hobby. Running your own business online you can stop the commute, and you can feel good because you are helping to cut pollution too.

You can work part time building your new homw business online until you see it taking off. You aren’t giving up your bill paying regular job to jump in without any income. Your homw business can be as far reaching as you want, it can offer something for your local community. It can equally sell to people around the world, without penalty. It doesn’t cost any extra to send an email to Australia, or for your website to be used to make a purchase by someone in Europe. Starting a home business online means you have a continuously growing market as more and more people come online everyday.

For more information on how to create a no stress homw busineess contact:

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
Independent Trivita Business Affiliate 13106887
(read more)

Homw Business

Bad Times are Good Times for Homw Business

In uncertain economic times homw business has typically flourished going back all the way through the Great Depression. Some small home business opportunities became multi-billion dollar companies built entirely on direct sales of their products to homw owners.

These were needed products to either improve your health and wellbeing or items that were houshold staples, necessities. The Fuller Brush Company was just one such company that made their fortune in direct sales during bad times. If you are searching for ways to earn an extra income you might want to research Trivita on Google for their unique cooperative marketing approach to building a substantial homw business.

For more information on how you can create a no stress home business contact:

C.J. Roberson
Independant TriVita Business Affiliate 13106887
912-682.7784
(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ3

You can find insurance agents who simply move out after moving along the cold leads just because it is too cold. This is because they fail on convincing people to take up an insurance policy. Today there are plenty of ways to overcome the cold market and the most important one among them is to pre-qualify insurance leads depending on the needs of the person and if and only if the person can handle the amount to pay for it. These are known as free health insurance leads as you do not need to pay from your pocket and with this you can simply convert to paying customers.

The first thing is to conduct a complete and thorough search by asking your friends as well as your relatives. They are the major ways through which you can get in touch with different people and with complete reliability. With their prospect you can relate to people across the globe trusting you and thus refer you with gratitude. This can take you to great sales to attain your goal without much effort.

The next step is to sign into any of the insurance leads websites that are on Google and they are going to be doing great for you. These are the ones searching out for sales agents for the purpose of qualifying health insurance leads. The leads from this website are absolutely free of cost and here the only work to be done is to sell new product to the old clients and so on.

Research is very important and you can do it on your own prospects and give more importance to the insurance leads which came in from your friends and family. There are different types of people and in here you can find many of them who need an affordable health insurance but cannot pay for it whereas others who are not even aware of such a project unless you approach them. There might be a group of people who would simply like to know about your project, they can be a little easier for you to handle as they might fall into the need when they come to know about its benefits and lot more. All that is to done is to convince the health lead how well it is and what good it will be to them.

Customers Are the Backbone of any Business - Not Leads

Buying customers is a masterful idea and is changing the world of business. Why not build a customer based online business with It's Good Business. Plus you can use Cooperative Marketing to purchase a customer base of paying customers. Its time to change the way business is done, with all the hype and completely unethical

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ2

Thousands of insurance agents across the country turn to internet such as Google for health insurance leads. Get the leads that convert to quality customers. With fewer people getting health coverage at work, the opportunity to make individual health sales keeps growing. And so is the number of people using the internet to grow your agencies.

As an insurance agent, you are probably well aware of the ways that the internet has changed the industry. One such way is how you get in touch with insurance leads. Do you call every lead that you obtain? Or do you consider other options of communicating such as email? This is something that is very important. After all, some insurance leads want to receive a phone call but others would much rather use email to stay in touch.

You should always honor the wishes of the consumer. If they request a phone call, give it to them. But if they say that email is the best way to communicate, start out with this. Remember, you can always suggest that they give you a call to make things easier.

Is it better to call the prospect leads? Well, if the prospect does not mind, the answer may be yes. When speaking on the phone you have a much better chance of convincing the prospect that you have what they need. To go along with this, this also allows you to be more efficient with your time. As you probably know, it can take a lot of time to go back and forth with a lead via email. But once again, if this is what they want to do, you should do so.

No matter what, you need to get in touch with every insurance lead in one way or the next. If you need to call a lead, so be it. If they want to communicate via email, that is fine as well. The key is to get the conversation started so that you can better your chances of making a sale.

It's Good Business

ItsGoodBusiness business model will show you exactly how to build a lucrative and sustaining business on Google the right way by buying paying customers. I purchase customers already enjoying the benefits of superior products and service. Customers that are satisfied and happy. These customers cost $50.00 each. That is it! No spending my hard earn money trying to promote a product and spending countless hours with no guarantee of success. No trying to develop a lead into hopefully joining you in business. Thats not Good Business!

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
(read more)

Insurance Leads CJ1

No matter what type of insurance agent you are, you can always buy insurance leads if you are looking for a way to increase sales. This is not a guarantee, but it is definitely something to consider. When you buy insurance leads you can cut back a bit on the marketing that you have to do on your own. To go along with this, you can better organize the leads that you have available and the calls that you need to make.

The best way to buy insurance leads is just do a Google search for the keyword insurance leads for health. This allows you to quickly get what you want, when you want them. And as noted above, with the help of the internet you can also stay more organized. As an insurance agent, staying organized is very important. It allows you to move from one task to the next without getting lost. When you do this, you will find that you are making a more efficient use of your time.

All agents have the ability to buy insurance leads. The question is: are you going to take advantage of this? If you want to become a top selling agent, your answer should be yes. When you buy insurance leads you will be more organized and in a better position to succeed.

But do I really need to buy insurance leads? This is a common question. Of course, the answer is no. You do not have to buy insurance leads, and there is nobody who will tell you that you do. That beings aid, you will want to consider this if you are trying to sell more policies and make more money. When you buy leads you can spend more time selling and less time marketing. There is nothing wrong with marketing your services, but soon enough you need to turn this into sales.

Health Insurance Leads industry provides all kinds of lead programs but none are guaranteed success. Many insurance agents quit soon after going through cold leads, precisely because cold leads can be exactly just that - cold. And many agents find that they can approach hundreds of people yet convince very few on an insurance policy.

Try and Buy Customers

It's Good Business! We teach you how to buy customers not leads to build your home business. These are not distributors; these a real customers who want to buy products. It even gets better! You don’t have to advertise for these customers or even talk to them. It's Good Business, of which I am a major part, we teach our team members to buy customers, Not Leads! You can do the same if you will just go to It's Good Business, fill out the form and come to our Wednesday and Saturday business opportunity meeting.

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson
(read more)

Insurance Leads

It can be tough to find reliable, high quality lead sources that are also fairly priced even on Google. Fortunately, there are a number of companies online that do provide the quality/price combination you are looking for--but there are also some that don't live up to your expectations. Finding the right company by simplying trying them all one at a time can be not only time consuming, but costly as well. This is why we built Insurance Leads Reviewed - to help other insurance agents avoid pit falls and "cut to the chase" with the best lead providers.

All leads are pre-qualified and are people interested in receiving a Health Insurance quote. They are expecting a response and quote. All Insurance leads are $5.00 each, and will be automatically emailed to you once your request is received and approved. No refunds or replacements. More leads, more sales, more money! Providing the highest quality lead for agents in the Individual and Small Group Health Insurance Market. You are guaranteed that these leads are the finest in the health insurance industry. Over the past years, thousands of producers, top producers, and managers use and highly profit from leads in all areas of the country! We believe that over the years of specializing in this industry, that you are delivered a very good HIGH quality lead initiated by the consumer! (the consumer is soliciting your help, unlike a telemarketed lead that solicits consumers).

These health insurance leads include applicant's contact information, age, weight, marital status of each prospective member, medical history and much more. Information is well organized and complete for the purpose of providing prospect with health insurance quotes. Prospects know they will be contacted by agents and are awaiting health insurance quotes from agents. The system identifies active health insurance agents on our data base with matching territory, health insurance leads profile criteria and sends them to the respective agents in minutes via email.

You offer a large variety of filters for our health insurance leads, including FREE filters for pre-existing major medical conditions, pregnancy, and limit of health insurance leads by day, week or month, limits of territory by selected zip codes or a radius around zip code. Individual selection or exclusions of pre-existing conditions available upon request and carries surcharges, based on individual request.

Why Buy Expensive Health Insurance Leads

I have bought leads and would never recommend buying leads, it is a waste of money for most people. Do your research when buying leads, talk to others who have purchased leads and you will find that most people have terrible results when buying leads for a home based business. If you don't want to deal with the hassle of Insurance leads, insurance leads for health, health insurance leads, and lead generation and then convincing people to buy your product, think about this.

There is a better way than buying Insurance leads - simply buy the customers. Buying your customers is better than buying health insurance leads! Buying customers is much more effective than buying leads.

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
cjroberson@buycustomers.net
Skype me: christopherroberson

(read more)

Overcoming Isolation

When you think about what it would be like to work a home based business. There are obvious benefits such as working your own hours, not having to face a stressful, tedious commute every day, actually seeing what your garden looks like in daylight hours, not having to answer to a boss, being home when your children are, working in a comfortable environment and so on.

Before long, though, you may begin to think back to your previous life and realize you actually miss those umpteen visitors who were constantly interrupting you when you were trying to work, the walk in the park at lunchtime with your best work-friend, drinks on Friday night after work, and being able to run an idea past a colleague for instant, valuable feedback.

Now, everything is just, well, quiet. And there’s no-one down the hall to go visit who’s over age four. You find yourself checking your email constantly, wanting to connect to someone. You find yourself wishing the phone would ring. You! The person who, when you worked in a job, cursed constant telephone interruptions and thought voice- and e-mail was the greatest invention since sliced bread. Welcome to another reality of home-based business … home alone.

Here are some ways to avoid the isolation trap when running a home based business:

Establish a Structure! Nothing is surer to reinforce feelings of isolation as time that stretches as far as the eye can see like a straight, one lane highway through a flat, barren landscape. Don’t start each day without a plan of what you intend to do. You need to structure your time so that it is not some endlessly vast terrain you must traverse alone. So write a to-do list, preferably at the end of the day before, so that when your work day starts you get productive straight away, before the isolation blues have a chance to take hold.

Reach Out! When writing your to-do list, make sure you include at least two things every day that require you to interact with another person. Networking is a vital skill, whether you work for someone else or for yourself. So make contacts with people who can add value to your business, as well as connecting you with the outside world.

Joining a professional group or club, attending seminars and trade shows relevant to your business are all great ways to meet new people who have similar interests and challenges. Participate in the activities organized by these groups and take a good supply of business cards with you.

Establish Joint Ventures! Another way to keep the isolation blues at bay is to joint venture with other home-based business owners. Team up with other businesses that offer complementary services to your business. Not only will you send additional business each other’s way in the form of referrals, you are establishing professional relationships with your joint venture partners.

Organize Your Own Functions! Once you have joined various associations and formed joint venture partnerships, take the initiative and organize functions that bring you all together. These could be business-oriented networking sessions or purely social get-togethers such as a barbeque in the local park. Either way, you are forging a relationship with people in your new arena, just as you did when you were working in a corporate office. The only difference is that now you must take the initiative to forge these relationships. These are not people you are going to be seeing every day at the office.

Join a Gym! You are, of course, health conscious and physically active, right? Of course you are! So, why not kill two birds with one stone … stay fit and meet new people. If you establish a routine that allows you to be at the gym at the same time every day, you will run into many of the same people and get to know them.

Use the Internet! Making online friends is another way of staying connected with the outside world. Be very disciplined here though. It’s way too easy to spend a lot of work time on social email exchanges and in chat rooms. Don’t fritter away your time, but do seek out and maintain internet friendships.

Background Noise! Sometimes, it’s only silence that reminds you you’re alone. If you come from a corporate environment, your workday was punctuated by the constant background noise of telephones ringing, other people’s conversations, hysterical laughter from the other end of the office and lunch trolley pages over the intercom system. If you find absolute quiet irksome, turn on the radio and have it playing in the background while you work. Talk stations are good because it’s like having other people in the next room, but if you find yourself becoming so engrossed with the talk topics that you stop working and start listening, switch to a music station.

There is no avoiding the fact that making the transition from a corporate environment to a home based business is just that … a transition. Most people will have to grapple with the isolation monster in the early days of their work-from-home career. But, as you can see, there are many ways of keeping isolation and loneliness at bay just by reaching out and forming new associations. Remember, just because you work alone doesn’t mean you have to go it alone.

C.J.Roberson
800-466-6930
Skype me: christopherroberson

(read more)

africaforum

February 5th, 2009 admin

nutritionalfoods

February 5th, 2009 admin

wi1p

February 5th, 2009 admin

7 ideas how to get rich in a recession

Two weeks back, we looked at a few of the most useful, and easy-to-find, metrics for quickly getting a handle on a company's investment potential. Running those down once more, they are: Market cap Enterprise value-to-free cash flow Historical and projected earnings growth EV/FCF/G Return on equity Insider ownership Share dilution The first six figures can be easily discovered with a bit of clicking around Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO) Finance's website. The last one, share dilution, is a little harder, but you can work it out without too much trouble from information on the SEC's FreeEdgar site. Now, veteran investors may argue that there are other metrics that give an even better picture of a company's financial condition. I agree completely. For instance, Tom Gardner developed structural free cash flow as an invaluable tool for measuring a small-cap company's true cash-generating power, and uses it almost exclusively when researching companies for each month's issue of Motley Fool Hidden Gems. Return on invested capital (ROIC) is another great tool, and one that becomes especially useful when you need to analyze a company with a heavy debt load. But while I admit that there are other, more math-intensive, metrics available, to borrow a phrase from Henry David Thoreau, I prefer to "simplify, simplify." After all, there are over 8,000 small-cap companies currently trading in the United States. The simpler and more efficient your tools, the faster you can dig through this gigantic corporate gravel pit and find the real gems. We cannot afford to get distracted by moss-bound boulders of the Lucent (NYSE: LU) variety, or to waste time picking at profitless specks of fool's gold such as Xybernaut (Nasdaq: XYBR) -- there is real work to be done here. On that note, here is my five-minute drill for quickly sizing up whether a given company is a possible gem -- or just a hunk of rock. Market cap Gems come in all sizes. But let's face it, if you want to buy yourself something the size and quality of the Hope Diamond, or its equivalent in stock market terms -- say, eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY) -- it's going to cost you a whole lot more than that pair of quarter-carat diamond studs you picked up for mom's birthday on Overstock.com (Nasdaq: OSTK). At Hidden Gems, we look to buy in the Overstock range, comfortably priced for any budget at a market cap between $100 million and $2 billion. Enterprise value-to-free cash flow Personally, I use market cap as only a rule of thumb. In truth, when I look at a company for the first time, my eyes go right to the enterprise value and free cash flow numbers. So for instance, when a few months back I found toymaker Hasbro (NYSE: HAS) selling for an EV/FCF ratio of 7.0, the fact that its market cap was $3.5 billion did not stop me from buying. Ascribe it to the inner cheapskate in me. Sometimes I just cannot resist a bargain. While I might balk at paying $30,000 for a new Chevy pickup -- if I should luck out and find a 2002 model selling for ten grand at CarMax (NYSE: KMX) some day, I may not be able to resist the urge to buy (but only if it's a stick shift -- some standards you just cannot compromise). In other words, I want my small caps to sell at bargain-basement prices. An EV/FCF ratio of 10 or less gets my attention real quick. Anything pricier than that, I need to take a good hard look at the company's growth rate and EV/FCF/G ratio. Historical and projected earnings growth rates All I want to say about growth rates is that you should always go with your most conservative guesstimate. Because yes, whether you are a professional analyst, a serious individual investor, or a newcomer to investing, when it comes to the future, we are really all just guessing. So if over the past five years your potential gem has increased earnings at an annualized rate of 10%, but a couple of anonymous "experts" say that over the next five years, the company is going to earn 45%, well, I just advise that you err on the side of caution. EV/FCF/G Picking a conservative growth rate estimate is crucial because of the huge effect it has on your EV/FCF/G calculation. A company with an EV/FCF of 30 might look like a classic value play, in the Benjamin Graham, The Intelligent Investor sense of yielding a 0.66 ratio when you use 45% as your growth estimate. But tread warily, dear Fool. If the company actually continues to churn out growth of only 10%, you will find you have bought yourself one terribly overvalued stock. As for the number I like to emerge from my EV/FCF/G calculation, I find a nice, round 1.0 quite appealing. On the one hand, I like the number because it offers a Graham-sized margin of safety to the market's current EV/FCF/G ratio of roughly 1.5. On the other, I like it because, in my experience, companies with EV/FCF/G ratios of 1.0 tend to double in value in relatively short order. Sadly, they usually do this while I am still sitting on the sidelines, hoping they will get just a little bit cheaper before I buy (a habit I am trying to break). Return on equity If the uncertainty and guesswork involved in estimating a company's earnings growth potential makes you a little queasy, consider a more definite method that many Fools have been experimenting with -- and run an EV/FCF/ROE calculation instead. The math is just as easy, and the principle is pretty much the same: you want the EV/FCF valuation to be lower than the company's return on equity -- the number that measures how efficiently the company invests in its own business. As with EV/FCF/G, the bigger the denominator (ROE), and the tinier the result of the full calculation, the better. (In other words, 1.0 is good. 1.5 or more is bad.) Insider ownership This one is both straightforward and tricky. The more insider ownership, the better -- up to a certain point. If company officers, directors, etc., own a significant stake in a company, they have a strong incentive to run the company well, use company funds efficiently, and keep a tight leash on share dilution. On the other hand, if insiders own too many of a company's shares, they effectively have control over the business and can run it any dang way they like. Personally, I like to see double-digit insider ownership, say at least 10%, but no more than 50%. Share dilution Read my lips: no new shares. Period. I hate share dilution with a vengeance that borders on rabidity. Companies that dilute minority shareholders at double-digit rates will not receive the benefit of my investing dollars under any circumstances. Share dilution of 3% or less will win my (grudging) approval, but only if all the other numbers look good. And there you have it, folks. My seven-step program to finding potential small cap winners. Give it a spin yourself, and when you think you have found a winner, share the good news on the Hidden Gems Stocks That Interest You board -- only on Fool.com, and only for Hidden Gems members (but feel free to try it out risk-free with a trial subscription). (read more)

jamesmclellan

February 4th, 2009 admin

Home Based Business Questions to Ask

Home-based business opportunities.

After five years of doing this I would offer some advice. Beware if: 1) Your distributor doesn’t spontaneously reveal the company he is with. 2) Total cost of joining the organization. 3) Minimum cost of doing the business per month. 4) Preferred business operation cost per month and why the extra charges. 5) Business tools you get for each price and what you can do with them. 6) Autoship. 7) How many other companies are linked to his company, with names and URL information. 8) The duration of all contracts or memberships and the general terms (cost per month, cost for termination, automatic renewal, and so forth). 9) Evasive response: “It’s the job of the trainer to answer your questions.” 10) No response at all or general evasiveness. 11) Whether email addresses and phone numbers of friends and family must be entered as part of your initiation, to prove you are “teachable.” 12) Duration of the training. 13) Discrepancies between company disclaimers and the gist of all video and audio presentations. 14) Whether the training hype amounts to “voluntary” brainwashing. 15) How minutely you are supervised and have to report to your upline and on what. 16) What happens if you miss a conference call. 17) Availability of upline if working full-time. 18) Need for a merchant account to process credit cards for the company. 19) Disclaimers like: “That’s another company we don’t control. They have their own rules and charges. We have nothing to do with it.” Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 http://www.protrackerplus.com/2587/leadsonpn.html From: jcmcl812@gmail.com (read more)

Distractions from Twitter

Tweeting, texting render avid users 'present yet absent'

By Olivia Barker, USA TODAY

Fran Stover sent out an electronic "It's a boy!" birth announcement, complete with picture, when she upgraded to a burgundy BlackJack II from Samsung in March. She nicknamed "him" Jack. When she knew she wouldn't have access to him for a spell, she worried about hurting his feelings and wondered if she should hire a babysitter. Lucy Hackman flew to Bermuda last month for a wedding. On her way to the hotel, she fixed her attention not on the miles of ocean outside her taxi window but on the tiny window of her BlackBerry.

GOING DIGITAL-FREE: Five readers take the challenge Megan Renz, who typically sends around 700 texts a day, including rapid-fire sessions when she's at the park with her 4-year-old son, Landon, curbed her online habit slightly during a Hawaiian vacation in May, when she jumped on her computer for only four hours a day. For fun.

Restaurant meals, family outings and holiday gatherings — not to mention movie dates, birthday parties and even baby showers — used to be about enjoying the moment of, say, a shared joke, a knowing glance or a sip of cold beer over a sunset. Now, thanks to technology, those moments are multi-tasked to the minute, to the point where even the digitally addicted admit they're so burrowed into their virtual lives they sometimes miss out on the real thing.

Cellphone cameras have replaced cigarette lighters as the concert torch of choice. Sure, scads of sequined gloves were dug out of closets, but Michael Jackson's memorial was remarkable more as a mass Facebook status update: 800,000 were posted during the two-hour tribute. For the July 15 premiere of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, actually attending the event was only half the goal, it seemed, as Hogwarts-dressed teens texted "wish you were here"-style postcards to those who weren't. And remember when then-presidential candidate Barack Obama was caught checking his BlackBerry during one of Malia's soccer games last summer — and was roundly reprimanded by Michelle, with a hand slap, for doing so?

It makes one wonder: Who will be around to watch the grass grow?"We're so entrenched in what we're doing" — in the palm of our hand or in the canal of our ear — "that we're not paying attention to the outside world," says Ray Soto, 30, who has run into walls because his head is bowed into his iPhone. Technology's tether is "terrible," says Renz, 24, of Hilton, N.Y. "I have a life and job and family, and I'm still on the thing," a Pantech Slate, her 10th or so smartphone since 2006.

Digital dangers

We're all increasingly on them: A report released last year from M:Metrics, a mobile-media research firm, found that Americans browsed the Web an average of 4.6 hours a month from their smartphones, an 89% increase from 2007. A May study from consulting firm Gravitytank found that app-enabled phone owners spend an average of two hours a day on their devices, with nearly 40% of that time dedicated to app use. By 2013, smartphones will have doubled their share of the handset market, accounting for 20% of all cellphones, according to market research company In-Stat.

Of course, the safety risks linked to gadgets-on-the-go are well-documented: Last week, the Senate introduced legislation that aims to extend the ban on texting while driving. Even thumbing while on foot has its hazards: Last month, a texting teen tumbled down an uncovered manhole in Staten Island, N.Y. (She escaped serious injury.)

But it's the cultural consequences of shunning the corporeal moment in favor of the virtual one that are murkier. Dan Rasmus, director of business insights at Microsoft and co-author of Listening to the Future: Why It's Everybody's Business, calls one effect digital autism: When you're engrossed in the digital world, you're more disconnected from the social and physical world. In particular, it's the so-called virtuals, those born after 1999, who need watching. "They have parents and elder siblings behaving in a different way, so what are they learning about what's the right way to behave?"

Technology results in what psychologist Kenneth Gergen, a senior research professor at Swarthmore College, calls "absent presence": others are present, via a virtual connective thread, even though they're physically absent. It works the other way, too: You're at dinner, for example, and your partner disappears from the present moment by thumbing away under the tablecloth.

Frequent diner Sam Firer, whose public relations company represents two dozen restaurants in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Las Vegas, instructs his staff to stow their smartphones when they're at client restaurants, in part to set a good example for patrons: "I'd like my clients to know that we're not obnoxious, unlike many other diners these days."

That "green or blue glow" of a table-parked smartphone is emerging as the "subversive factor" in dining, says Frank Klein, a restaurant owner and consultant based in San Francisco and Boston. In the early part of the decade, traditional phone booths begat restaurant cellphone booths. "Now, maybe it's time to have a Twitter or text booth." When someone's eyes drift to an iPhone midsentence — when they are present but absent — Firer is known to swivel his chair so his back faces the speaker. "They're doing the same thing, in essence."

Losing our 'creatureliness'

What worries Gergen is when "the environment itself, that living world upon which our creatureliness is based, is separated from us," distanced through a glowing screen. Without sensual engagement with their surroundings, people are becoming "post-human," Gergen says, "more a part of their machine world than their biological world." Some companies are acknowledging this latest incarnation of the man-vs.-machine struggle with a wink. Consider that Corona beer's-eye-view-of-paradise ad, in which someone skips stones, and then his cellphone, into a lagoon after the phone starts buzzing. Or that Verizon/ESPN MVP ad in which a woman being feted at a baby shower watches college hoops highlights on her cell instead of oohing and aahing over her little-girl gifts.

Losing time to decompress

If we're interrupting our silver screen time with LED screen time, there's a social significance. In the past, waiting for a movie to start or an elevator to descend meant "you had a bit of forced downtime," says Patricia Wallace, head of online programs at Johns Hopkins' Center for Talented Youth and the author of The Psychology of the Internet. "It let you gather your wits or stare at the (floor) numbers. You were relieving your cognitive load" — you were engaging in forced relaxation. "Now you can suck up all those little slots of time and pour something into them, whether it's work or social, because you have a gadget."

Digital devotees see the shift. "I do think there's something to say about how we're not living in the moment and stopping to smell the roses," says New Yorker Karen Robinovitz, co-founder and creator of the new beauty brand Purple Lab. "But I think the roses are different now: They're virtual Facebook gifts," icons you send your Facebook friends as tokens of appreciation.

Robinovitz has started mashing together her online and in-person lives every month through tweet-ups, during which she and 10 to 15 similarly style-obsessed women gather to Twitter and, yes, talk between sips of lychee martinis. Robinovitz is the kind of person who, while heading to Sunday brunch with her husband, will tweet that very fact, which doesn't exactly thrill her better half. "He's like, 'C'mon, I want to spend time with you, not you on Twitter.'

"

So a couple of weeks ago, she put down her BlackBerry and, with her husband, strolled along the High Line, a new park in Manhattan built atop an old elevated train track. For an hour, she wasn't distracted by anything but the wildflower décor and rooftop views. "There was something incredibly refreshing about it." Somebody recently asked Robinovitz what achievement she was most proud of. She may have launched a lip gloss line in May, "and yet I was most proud of walking on the High Line and not Twittering."

Submitted by: http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 http://www.protrackerplus.com/2587/leadsonpn.html (read more)

Twitter Affects How We Live

Friday, Jun. 05, 2009

How Twitter Will Change the Way We Live

By Steven Johnson

The one thing you can say for certain about Twitter is that it makes a terrible first impression. You hear about this new service that lets you send 140-character updates to your "followers," and you think, Why does the world need this, exactly? It's not as if we were all sitting around four years ago scratching our heads and saying, "If only there were a technology that would allow me to send a message to my 50 friends, alerting them in real time about my choice of breakfast cereal."

I, too, was skeptical at first. I had met Evan Williams, Twitter's co-creator, a couple of times in the dotcom '90s when he was launching Blogger.com. Back then, what people worried about was the threat that blogging posed to our attention span, with telegraphic, two-paragraph blog posts replacing long-format articles and books. With Twitter, Williams was launching a communications platform that limited you to a couple of sentences at most. What was next? Software that let you send a single punctuation mark to describe your mood? (See the top 10 ways Twitter will change American business.)

And yet as millions of devotees have discovered, Twitter turns out to have unsuspected depth. In part this is because hearing about what your friends had for breakfast is actually more interesting than it sounds. The technology writer Clive Thompson calls this "ambient awareness": by following these quick, abbreviated status reports from members of your extended social network, you get a strangely satisfying glimpse of their daily routines. We don't think it at all moronic to start a phone call with a friend by asking how her day is going. Twitter gives you the same information without your even having to ask.

The social warmth of all those stray details shouldn't be taken lightly. But I think there is something even more profound in what has happened to Twitter over the past two years, something that says more about the culture that has embraced and expanded Twitter at such extraordinary speed. Yes, the breakfast-status updates turned out to be more interesting than we thought. But the key development with Twitter is how we've jury-rigged the system to do things that its creators never dreamed of. In short, the most fascinating thing about Twitter is not what it's doing to us. It's what we're doing to it. The Open Conversation

Earlier this year I attended a daylong conference in Manhattan devoted to education reform. Called Hacking Education, it was a small, private affair: 40-odd educators, entrepreneurs, scholars, philanthropists and venture capitalists, all engaged in a sprawling six-hour conversation about the future of schools. Twenty years ago, the ideas exchanged in that conversation would have been confined to the minds of the participants. Ten years ago, a transcript might have been published weeks or months later on the Web. Five years ago, a handful of participants might have blogged about their experiences after the fact. (See the top 10 celebrity Twitter feeds.)

But this event was happening in 2009, so trailing behind the real-time, real-world conversation was an equally real-time conversation on Twitter. At the outset of the conference, our hosts announced that anyone who wanted to post live commentary about the event via Twitter should include the word #hackedu in his 140 characters. In the room, a large display screen showed a running feed of tweets. Then we all started talking, and as we did, a shadow conversation unfolded on the screen: summaries of someone's argument, the occasional joke, suggested links for further reading. At one point, a brief argument flared up between two participants in the room — a tense back-and-forth that transpired silently on the screen as the rest of us conversed in friendly tones.

At first, all these tweets came from inside the room and were created exclusively by conference participants tapping away on their laptops or BlackBerrys. But within half an hour or so, word began to seep out into the Twittersphere that an interesting conversation about the future of schools was happening at #hackedu. A few tweets appeared on the screen from strangers announcing that they were following the #hackedu thread. Then others joined the conversation, adding their observations or proposing topics for further exploration. A few experts grumbled publicly about how they hadn't been invited to the conference. Back in the room, we pulled interesting ideas and questions from the screen and integrated them into our face-to-face conversation.

When the conference wrapped up at the end of the day, there was a public record of hundreds of tweets documenting the conversation. And the conversation continued — if you search Twitter for #hackedu, you'll find dozens of new comments posted over the past few weeks, even though the conference happened in early March.

Injecting Twitter into that conversation fundamentally changed the rules of engagement. It added a second layer of discussion and brought a wider audience into what would have been a private exchange. And it gave the event an afterlife on the Web. Yes, it was built entirely out of 140-character messages, but the sum total of those tweets added up to something truly substantive, like a suspension bridge made of pebbles.

The Super-Fresh Web

The basic mechanics of Twitter are remarkably simple. Users publish tweets — those 140-character messagesfrom a computer or mobile device. (The character limit allows tweets to be created and circulated via the SMS platform used by most mobile phones.) As a social network, Twitter revolves around the principle of followers. When you choose to follow another Twitter user, that user's tweets appear in reverse chronological order on your main Twitter page. If you follow 20 people, you'll see a mix of tweets scrolling down the page: breakfast-cereal updates, interesting new links, music recommendations, even musings on the future of education. Some celebrity Twitterers — most famously Ashton Kutcher — have crossed the million-follower mark, effectively giving them a broadcast-size audience.

The average Twitter profile seems to be somewhere in the dozens: a collage of friends, colleagues and a handful of celebrities. The mix creates a media experience quite unlike anything that has come before it, strangely intimate and at the same time celebrity-obsessed. You glance at your Twitter feed over that first cup of coffee, and in a few seconds you find out that your nephew got into med school and Shaquille O'Neal just finished a cardio workout in Phoenix. (See excerpts from the world's most popular Twitterers.)

In the past month, Twitter has added a search box that gives you a real-time view onto the chatter of just about any topic imaginable. You can see conversations people are having about a presidential debate or the American Idol finale or Tiger Woods — or a conference in New York City on education reform. For as long as we've had the Internet in our homes, critics have bemoaned the demise of shared national experiences, like moon landings and "Who Shot J.R." cliff hangers — the folkloric American living room, all of us signing off in unison with Walter Cronkite, shattered into a million isolation booths.

But watch a live mass-media event with Twitter open on your laptop and you'll see that the futurists had it wrong. We still have national events, but now when we have them, we're actually having a genuine, public conversation with a group that extends far beyond our nuclear family and our next-door neighbors. Some of that conversation is juvenile, of course, just as it was in our living room when we heckled Richard Nixon's Checkers speech. But some of it is moving, witty, observant, subversive.

Skeptics might wonder just how much subversion and wit is conveyable via 140-character updates. But in recent months Twitter users have begun to find a route around that limitation by employing Twitter as a pointing device instead of a communications channel: sharing links to longer articles, discussions, posts, videos — anything that lives behind a URL. Websites that once saw their traffic dominated by Google search queries are seeing a growing number of new visitors coming from "passed links" at social networks like Twitter and Facebook. This is what the naysayers fail to understand: it's just as easy to use Twitter to spread the word about a brilliant 10,000-word New Yorker article as it is to spread the word about your Lucky Charms habit.

Put those three elements together — social networks, live searching and link-sharing — and you have a cocktail that poses what may amount to the most interesting alternative to Google's near monopoly in searching. At its heart, Google's system is built around the slow, anonymous accumulation of authority: pages rise to the top of Google's search results according to, in part, how many links point to them, which tends to favor older pages that have had time to build an audience. That's a fantastic solution for finding high-quality needles in the immense, spam-plagued haystack that is the contemporary Web. But it's not a particularly useful solution for finding out what people are saying right now, the in-the-moment conversation that industry pioneer John Battelle calls the "super fresh" Web. Even in its toddlerhood, Twitter is a more efficient supplier of the super-fresh Web than Google. If you're looking for interesting articles or sites devoted to Kobe Bryant, you search Google. If you're looking for interesting comments from your extended social network about the three-pointer Kobe just made 30 seconds ago, you go to Twitter.

From Toasters to Microwaves

Because Twitter's co-founders — Evan Williams, Biz Stone and Jack Dorsey — are such a central-casting vision of start-up savvy (they're quotable and charming and have the extra glamour of using a loft in San Francisco's SoMa district as a headquarters instead of a bland office park in Silicon Valley) much of the media interest in Twitter has focused on the company. Will Ev and Biz sell to Google early or play long ball? (They have already turned down a reported $500 million from Facebook.) It's an interesting question but not exactly a new plotline. Focusing on it makes you lose sight of the much more significant point about the Twitter platform: the fact that many of its core features and applications have been developed by people who are not on the Twitter payroll.

This is not just a matter of people finding a new use for a tool designed to do something else. In Twitter's case, the users have been redesigning the tool itself. The convention of grouping a topic or event by the "hashtag" — #hackedu or #inauguration — was spontaneously invented by the Twitter user base (as was the convention of replying to another user with the @ symbol). The ability to search a live stream of tweets was developed by another start-up altogether, Summize, which Twitter purchased last year. (Full disclosure: I am an adviser to one of the minority investors in Summize.)

Thanks to these innovations, following a live feed of tweets about an event — political debates or Lost episodes — has become a central part of the Twitter experience. But just 12 months ago, that mode of interaction would have been technically impossible using Twitter. It's like inventing a toaster oven and then looking around a year later and seeing that your customers have of their own accord figured out a way to turn it into a microwave. (See the 50 best inventions of 2008.)

One of the most telling facts about the Twitter platform is that the vast majority of its users interact with the service via software created by third parties. There are dozens of iPhone and BlackBerry applications — all created by enterprising amateur coders or small start-ups — that let you manage Twitter feeds. There are services that help you upload photos and link to them from your tweets, and programs that map other Twitizens who are near you geographically. Ironically, the tools you're offered if you visit Twitter.com have changed very little in the past two years. But there's an entire Home Depot of Twitter tools available everywhere else.

As the tools have multiplied, we're discovering extraordinary new things to do with them. Last month an anticommunist uprising in Moldova was organized via Twitter. Twitter has become so widely used among political activists in China that the government recently blocked access to it, in an attempt to censor discussion of the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. A service called SickCity scans the Twitter feeds from multiple urban areas, tracking references to flu and fever. Celebrity Twitterers like Kutcher have directed their vast followings toward charitable causes (in Kutcher's case, the Malaria No More organization).

Social networks are notoriously vulnerable to the fickle tastes of teens and 20-somethings (remember Friendster?), so it's entirely possible that three or four years from now, we'll have moved on to some Twitter successor. But the key elements of the Twitter platform — the follower structure, link-sharing, real-time searching — will persevere regardless of Twitter's fortunes, just as Web conventions like links, posts and feeds have endured over the past decade. In fact, every major channel of information will be Twitterfied in one way or another in the coming years:

News and opinion. Increasingly, the stories that come across our radar — news about a plane crash, a feisty Op-Ed, a gossip item — will arrive via the passed links of the people we follow. Instead of being built by some kind of artificially intelligent software algorithm, a customized newspaper will be compiled from all the articles being read that morning by your social network. This will lead to more news diversity and polarization at the same time: your networked front page will be more eclectic than any traditional-newspaper front page, but political partisans looking to enhance their own private echo chamber will be able to tune out opposing viewpoints more easily.

Searching. As the archive of links shared by Twitter users grows, the value of searching for information via your extended social network will start to rival Google's approach to the search. If you're looking for information on Benjamin Franklin, an essay shared by one of your favorite historians might well be more valuable than the top result on Google; if you're looking for advice on sibling rivalry, an article recommended by a friend of a friend might well be the best place to start.

Advertising. Today the language of advertising is dominated by the notion of impressions: how many times an advertiser can get its brand in front of a potential customer's eyeballs, whether on a billboard, a Web page or a NASCAR hood. But impressions are fleeting things, especially compared with the enduring relationships of followers. Successful businesses will have millions of Twitter followers (and will pay good money to attract them), and a whole new language of tweet-based customer interaction will evolve to keep those followers engaged: early access to new products or deals, live customer service, customer involvement in brainstorming for new products.

Not all these developments will be entirely positive. Most of us have learned firsthand how addictive the micro-events of our personal e-mail inbox can be. But with the ambient awareness of status updates from Twitter and Facebook, an entire new empire of distraction has opened up. It used to be that you compulsively checked your BlackBerry to see if anything new had happened in your personal life or career: e-mail from the boss, a reply from last night's date. Now you're compulsively checking your BlackBerry for news from other people's lives. And because, on Twitter at least, some of those people happen to be celebrities, the Twitter platform is likely to expand that strangely delusional relationship that we have to fame. When Oprah tweets a question about getting ticks off her dog, as she did recently, anyone can send an @ reply to her, and in that exchange, there is the semblance of a normal, everyday conversation between equals. But of course, Oprah has more than a million followers, and that isolated query probably elicited thousands of responses. Who knows what small fraction of her @ replies she has time to read? But from the fan's perspective, it feels refreshingly intimate: "As I was explaining to Oprah last night, when she asked about dog ticks ..."

End-User Innovation

The rapid-fire innovation we're seeing around Twitter is not new, of course. Facebook, whose audience is still several times as large as Twitter's, went from being a way to scope out the most attractive college freshmen to the Social Operating System of the Internet, supporting a vast ecosystem of new applications created by major media companies, individual hackers, game creators, political groups and charities. The Apple iPhone's long-term competitive advantage may well prove to be the more than 15,000 new applications that have been developed for the device, expanding its functionality in countless ingenious ways.

The history of the Web followed a similar pattern. A platform originally designed to help scholars share academic documents, it now lets you watch television shows, play poker with strangers around the world, publish your own newspaper, rediscover your high school girlfriend — and, yes, tell the world what you had for breakfast. Twitter serves as the best poster child for this new model of social creativity in part because these innovations have flowered at such breathtaking speed and in part because the platform is so simple. It's as if Twitter's creators dared us to do something interesting by giving us a platform with such draconian restrictions. And sure enough, we accepted the dare with relish. Just 140 characters? I wonder if I could use that to start a political uprising. (See the 25 best blogs of 2009.)

The speed with which users have extended Twitter's platform points to a larger truth about modern innovation. When we talk about innovation and global competitiveness, we tend to fall back on the easy metric of patents and Ph.D.s. It turns out the U.S. share of both has been in steady decline since peaking in the early '70s. (In 1970, more than 50% of the world's graduate degrees in science and engineering were issued by U.S. universities.) Since the mid-'80s, a long progression of doomsayers have warned that our declining market share in the patents-and-Ph.D.s business augurs dark times for American innovation. The specific threats have changed. It was the Japanese who would destroy us in the '80s; now it's China and India.

But what actually happened to American innovation during that period? We came up with America Online, Netscape, Amazon, Google, Blogger, Wikipedia, Craigslist, TiVo, Netflix, eBay, the iPod and iPhone, Xbox, Facebook and Twitter itself. Sure, we didn't build the Prius or the Wii, but if you measure global innovation in terms of actual lifestyle-changing hit products and not just grad students, the U.S. has been lapping the field for the past 20 years.

How could the forecasts have been so wrong? The answer is that we've been tracking only part of the innovation story. If I go to grad school and invent a better mousetrap, I've created value, which I can protect with a patent and capitalize on by selling my invention to consumers. But if someone else figures out a way to use my mousetrap to replace his much more expensive washing machine, he's created value as well. We tend to put the emphasis on the first kind of value creation because there are a small number of inventors who earn giant paydays from their mousetraps and thus become celebrities. But there are hundreds of millions of consumers and small businesses that find value in these innovations by figuring out new ways to put them to use.

There are several varieties of this kind of innovation, and they go by different technical names. MIT professor Eric von Hippel calls one "end-user innovation," in which consumers actively modify a product to adapt it to their needs. In its short life, Twitter has been a hothouse of end-user innovation: the hashtag; searching; its 11,000 third-party applications; all those creative new uses of Twitter — some of them banal, some of them spam and some of them sublime. Think about the community invention of the @ reply. It took a service that was essentially a series of isolated microbroadcasts, each individual tweet an island, and turned Twitter into a truly conversational medium. All of these adoptions create new kinds of value in the wider economy, and none of them actually originated at Twitter HQ. You don't need patents or Ph.D.s to build on this kind of platform.

This is what I ultimately find most inspiring about the Twitter phenomenon. We are living through the worst economic crisis in generations, with apocalyptic headlines threatening the end of capitalism as we know it, and yet in the middle of this chaos, the engineers at Twitter headquarters are scrambling to keep the servers up, application developers are releasing their latest builds, and ordinary users are figuring out all the ingenious ways to put these tools to use. There's a kind of resilience here that is worth savoring. The weather reports keep announcing that the sky is falling, but here we are — millions of us — sitting around trying to invent new ways to talk to one another.

Johnson is the author of six books, most recently The Invention of Air, and a co-founder of the local-news website outside.in

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Twitter More Widely Used

Twitter has millions tweeting in public communication service By Jon Swartz, USA TODAY

SAN FRANCISCO — It's tea time at Twitter. While that may evoke images of courtly discussion over Earl Grey and finger sandwiches, it's quite another thing at Silicon Valley's new "it" company.

The idea is that any employee can step in front of the 43-person start-up and offer a no-holds-barred weekly critique on a Friday afternoon. Co-founders Evan Williams, Jack Dorsey and Biz Stone often watch from the back, taking mental notes. Some employees recite poems; others make wacky slide presentations. The point is to express what the company means to them.

In another tradition, Alison Sudol, a musician with more than 500,000 followers on Twitter, this month spoke at headquarters, part of a monthly ritual in which artists and academics drop by to impart wisdom and entertain.

Both events underscore the bottom-up culture fostered by Twitter's unassuming co-founders, who have become reluctant media stars. "Tech founders get a little too much emphasis," CEO Evan Williams says. "So many people here contribute to our success."

Today, it seems everyone wants a piece of Twitter. There have been rumors of takeover overtures from Google, Facebook and Apple. Twitter, like Google, has become a verb (though the proper term is "tweet"). Twitter's co-founders have had a profound impact on how millions of people communicate. Yet, despite appearances on Oprah,The View and The Colbert Report, many refer to them as simply The Twitter Guys.

"They've created a new way for people to communicate publicly and instantaneously," says Fred Wilson, a venture capitalist who is on the company's six-member board and an investor.

The trio, all in their 30s, are college dropouts with a modest track record of success. Each helped start a company before Twitter. Dorsey invented the service out of his deep fascination with taxi dispatches and city grids. Williams began reading business books for fun as a teenager. Stone wrote two books on blogging, and is Twitter's de facto public relations department.

They're sitting on a potential gold mine. The 3-year-old firm raised $35 million in February alone — $55 million to date — and was recently valued at about $100 million.

To be sure, behind the feel-good vibes, meteoric growth and nationwide fixation, Twitter's founders face issues of user retention, outages and persistent questions about monetization. Such are the challenges for a highflying start-up trying to live up to its considerable hype in the worst economy in more than 70 years.

Yet, industry leaders such as Zappos.com CEO Tony Hsieh are convinced Twitter is up to the task. "All three (Twitter founders) have the belief that Twitter can change the world and the passion to make it actually happen," says Hsieh, a Web sales guru and fan of Twitter.

No slam-dunk

Millions of people use Twitter to trade short messages of 140 characters or less — think haiku — via the Web and cellphones. The free service is the fastest-growing major website in the U.S. It had 17 million registered users in the U.S. in April — up 3,000% from a year ago, according to market researcher ComScore.

Celebrities such as Ashton Kutcher (1.5 million followers) and athlete Shaquille O'Neal (950,000) have added to its popularity. Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff, an occasional adviser, believes the service will lead to new categories on the Web — "from real-time journalism to the next generation of customer service and call centers."

Before it gets there, however, Twitter must navigate several hurdles. Look no further than to Twitter Quitters, the cutesy nickname for users who quit after less than a month. Twitter's retention rate — people who return the next month — is about 40%, Nielsen Online says. Facebook and MySpace have rates of more than 60%.

There also is chronic second-guessing from users and tech analysts about Twitter's occasional outages and what it should do next — particularly, how it will make money in a sagging economy and whether it will be sold. (For the record, Williams says there is "no interest in selling.")

"Twitter must have the most armchair quarterbacks of any start-up in recent memory, except possibly Facebook," says Laura Fitton, a consultant and co-author of Twitter for Dummies.

Twitter experienced second-guessing full bore when it abruptly dropped a feature used by less than 3% of its users that removes some comments. "We screwed up," says Stone, who notes Twitter will soon have a solution. "There is so much going on here, we let it fall through the cracks." Adds Williams: "We did a poor job of communicating. When you evolve the service, you may upset people in the process. If you stand pat, you risk being stagnant."

The challenges don't end there. Twitter, like its social media peers, must produce revenue. "Eventually, companies like Twitter are going to be forced to choose between huge user numbers or a smaller, truly active network of people willing to pay a nominal fee," says Sayles Braga, CEO of YellowPin, a social-networking service.

Twitter's brain trust has heard it all before. "It took Google four to five years for revenue," says Dorsey, who was just in Iraq to help the government improve communications with citizens. "We will be patient, too." The usually chatty Stone and circumspect Williams are vague on how Twitter will evolve from hip technology to moneymaker. But Stone allows the company has plans for tools and services by year's end that will help businesses serve customers, and it may charge fees for such services.

"The idea of taking money to run traditional banner ads on Twitter.com has always been low on our list of interesting ways to generate revenue," Stone mused in a blog post last week. "However, facilitating connections between businesses and individuals in meaningful and relevant ways is compelling."

One new effort was announced Monday: an unscripted TV series based on the site that, according to the Associated Press, would "harness Twitter to put players on the trail of celebrities in an interactive, competitive format."

The brain trust

The weight of all of the lofty expectations rests squarely on the slight shoulders of Williams, 37, who oversees daily operations. The Clarks, Neb., native succeeded Dorsey as chief executive in October. He has successfully navigated a start-up before. As co-founder of Blogger, one of the first applications for creating and managing blogs, he helped sell it to Google for an undisclosed amount in 2003.

Following Blogger's sale, Williams was not long for Google. He eventually hooked up with a friend, Noah Glass, to start Odeo, at the time a podcasting company. It was there that the Twitter concept was born.

"Ev is the total package," says Chris Sacca, one of Twitter's first investors and an adviser. "He reminds me so much of (Sacca's former Google bosses and co-founders) Sergey (Brin) and Larry (Page). They understand products and how they can fit in the future."

The son of a now-retired farmer, Williams showed a predilection for commerce as a teenager. He read business books on real estate, marketing and publishing. "I realized I could buy books and learn something that people spent years learning about," says Williams, who dropped out of the University of Nebraska just as the Web was becoming a phenomenon, in 1994.

While Williams bears the operational brunt of running Twitter, the tireless Stone is the marketing hub. On a typical day, he fields 100 media requests. "Ev is the technology builder, and Biz is the evocative and communicative one," says Reid Hoffman, CEO of LinkedIn, the popular business-networking service.

Their partnership was born of a close working relationship and friendship built after starting out as business competitors. In 2000, Stone co-founded Xanga.com, a website that hosts blogs and social-networking profiles. It "looked a lot like MySpace before MySpace," he says. Its rival was Williams' Blogger.

After Google bought Blogger, Williams asked Stone to join Google to help reboot Blogger with a new design and features. "I didn't really know Evan then," Stone says. "We were just familiar with each others' work. There was a mutual admiration."

By 2005, they left Google for Odeo. Stone's timing could have been better — he gave up his Google stock options because he wasn't there long enough to be vested — but Odeo was where Twitter was born. "Twitter is so many things: a messaging service; a customer-service tool to reach customers, as proven by Zappos, Comcast and others; real-time search; and microblogging," says Stone, 35.

The least visible co-founder, Dorsey, 32, is rarely around the office and already onto his Next Big Thing. But the St. Louis native is the mastermind behind the notepad sketch in 2000 that led to Twitter. "My whole philosophy is making tech more accessible and human," Dorsey says.

When an image of the sketch was uploaded on the Internet in 2006, Dorsey wrote: "I had an idea to make a more 'live' LiveJournal. Real-time, up-to-date, from the road. Akin to updating your AIM status from wherever you are, and sharing it. …We're calling it twttr." "Jack's original vision was staggering for its potential, as well as its simplicity," Sacca says.

These days, Dorsey is chairman of the company's board of directors and a strategic adviser, but is devoting his energies to a top-secret start-up. He won't say much about the new venture — only that it involves tech and communications, and that it may make its debut this summer. In many ways, the boyish-looking Dorsey best captures the spirit and look of Twitter. He bears a forearm-length tattoo that he says represents an F-sharp, an integral symbol from mathematics, and a human clavicle — the only bone, he says, with "free range of motion."

"I'm a very low-level programmer," Dorsey says, chuckling. "This idea of a short, inconsequential burst of activity (Twitter) turned out pretty well."

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Direct Sales Offer Recession Proof Jobs

Direct sales (like Avon, Mary Kay) offer recession-proof jobs

By Charisse Jones, USA TODAY

Not long ago, Craig Lapp made his living driving a truck that helped carve Southern California's soil into new developments. But then housing sales slumped, and in November 2007 Lapp's construction company let him go. While he searched for another job, Lapp began working alongside his wife, Lynne, in a business based in their Temecula home, selling nutritional supplements made by the direct-sales company Isagenix. Nearly two years later and with no construction job in sight, Lapp says a one-time sideline has become the couple's bread and butter.

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"It's paying our mortgage, our car payments … putting food on the table," says Lapp, 55, who adds that he and his wife are earning a six-figure income. "It was our 'Plan B' that turned into our 'Plan A.' " Direct-sales businesses that rely on home-based representatives to peddle their wares are seeing their sales forces rapidly expand as the nation's unemployment rate soars to nearly 9% and those who lost jobs and nest eggs look for new ways to make money.

"We're recession-resistant in the sense that more people come to us during economic hard times for supplemental income or replacement of a lost job," says Neil Offen, president of the Direct Selling Association, the trade group that represents the largest U.S. direct sales companies.

While 2008 industry figures aren't yet available, "Anecdotally we're hearing that recruitment is up and … unfortunately as the unemployment rate rises to 10% or higher, we'll be picking up more people who need an income-earning opportunity."

The recession has become a recruiting tool. An Avon (AVP) cosmetics representative declares in TV ads that "I can't get laid off. It's my business." Companies such as Isagenix, a marketer of weight-management and nutritional supplements and snacks, and jewelry maker Silpada Designs are coaching their representatives to spread the word that direct selling can keep you afloat in the faltering economy.

"Right now, our direct-selling opportunity is really the No. 1 product that we have to sell," says Geralyn Breig, president of Avon North America. With that in mind, Avon this year launched its most ambitious recruitment campaign and saw its U.S. sales force grow to more than 680,000 through March, its largest ever, Breig says.

The same month, cosmetics company Mary Kay began airing its first TV ad for new representatives. In its first three days, visitors seeking information about becoming "beauty consultants" at MaryKay.com spiked 108%. Silpada Designs, a Lenexa, Kan.-based company specializing in sterling silver jewelry, says its sales force in the U.S. and Canada was up 11.8% on May 1 from a year earlier. And Chandler, Ariz.-based Isagenix says its sales force was up 30% in March from a year before. The hope is that larger sales forces will grow revenue, even in an economy that has shrunk sales for many companies.

"Representatives and recruiting are a leading indicator of future sales," says Jerry Kelly, Silpada's CEO, who acknowledges sales for his privately owned company were down roughly 10% in the fourth quarter of last year. "We're optimistic that we're going to fare fairly well this year as a company in a very difficult climate. … We're seeing a more determined and focused representative who might be looking to supplement lost income for their family."

There are roughly 15 million direct sellers in the U.S. — independent contractors who sell goods or services primarily through parties, demonstrations in someone's home and one-on-one interactions. In 2007, the most recent year available, the sales industry generated $30.8 billion in U.S. sales, according to the Direct Selling Association.

Sellers are recruiting

Avon aired its first infomercial last month, and rather than promoting makeup or skin products, it targets new recruits. The company kicked off its TV commercials earlier, with a 30-second spot during the Super Bowl pregame show in February. That ad, a 60-second spot and the infomercial will air all year.

The cosmetics company is also going to job fairs this year, scouting for new salespeople at more than 140 such events, Breig says. It's also beefed up its presence with online job search engines and since February has had a recruiting ad in the front of every one of its brochures. "We're executing the boldest recruitment campaign … in our history," Breig says. "It's part of our mission to enable women to have a financial solution."

That resonated with Elizabeth Leyba, an assistant office manager for a plumbing company who lives with her family in Munster, Ind. Leyba saw her hours cut last year and needed a way to make up her lost income while maintaining her office job and busy household. So in April 2008, after watching a TV commercial for Avon, she decided to give it a try. In the year since, she has discovered that she is an entrepreneur.

"I didn't know it, and I'm thrilled that I am," says Leyba, 39, who has sold more than $10,000 worth of Avon products and hopes to sell full time. "Even though there's a recession, even though the economy is bad, my business has continued to grow." Leyba's Avon earnings have paid for everything from gas to her 17-year-old son's senior pictures. "I've been working since I was 16 so, you know, I like the fact … it's your own business," Leyba says. "I am in control of my future now. Not corporations."

Compensation systems vary, but representatives primarily earn money from commissions on product sales or by purchasing the products wholesale and selling them at retail prices, says the Direct Selling Association. Commissions on sales typically are 25% to 50% of retail.

While representatives may also earn a small commission on the sales from representatives they've recruited, legitimate businesses do not use recruitment alone as a basis for compensation, the association says. Denise Ruiz-Cabrera, 31, of Branchburg, N.J., was nearly five months pregnant in March 2008 when she lost her job as a corporate recruiter. She could not find a new job.

"I exhausted almost every single contact that I had," she says of her search. Though she'd used Avon products, she'd never thought of selling them until this year. She saw one of Avon's recruitment ads, "and I thought to myself, 'Why don't I do that?'" Knocking on doors is history. Direct sales representatives now find new customers through such methods as referrals, gatherings and parties, spontaneous meetings on the street and the Internet. Ruiz-Cabrera is one who does it all.

"I've sort of coined the term, 'Welcome to 21st-century Avon,' " says Ruiz-Cabrera, who has a personalized website maintained by the company. She carries brochures in her purse and her baby's stroller, promotes favorite products on her Facebook page and meets new representatives she's recruited at the local Starbucks." I think people in these times, we're hungrier than we used to be," says Ruiz-Cabrera, who has made as much as $1,000 a month with Avon. "I had jobs lined up in the pipeline that all fell through because of the economy, and I focused all that energy on my business and in three months I've built something that looks to be pretty promising."

Retirees join in the trend

It's not only those who have lost jobs or endured pay cuts who have turned to direct selling. "We're hearing a lot from women who've recently graduated or are about to graduate and are finding it to be quite a challenge to find a career," says Rhonda Shasteen, Mary Kay's chief marketing officer. Then there "is the other end of the age spectrum: women who are approaching retirement age, and saw a lot of their savings wiped out, and find themselves with a very short time frame and with a need to make up a lot of money."

Lawanna Lloyd, 66, and her husband, Rodney, 69, retired in 2000. But in the wake of the stock market fall, Lloyd says they are now worth about half of what they were just 18 months ago. To make their retirement nest egg last longer, Lloyd's husband returned to work last year, teaching chemistry at a private school in their town of Boerne, Texas. Then Lloyd, who was a stay-at-home mom through most of her marriage, decided she needed something, too. "That's when I signed up with Silpada," she says.

She is rattled that there was a need for her and her husband to return to work at all. "It doesn't feel good," Lloyd acknowledges. "It makes life very uncertain, and scary. …Who wants to go back to work?" But she made more than $500 from her first jewelry parties in April, and she enjoyed hosting them. "I think Silpada does provide the perfect solution for earning some money and being able to set my own schedule," she says. "We had decided that we would do something … to earn income for four or five years and see where we are then. Hopefully by then the market will have recovered and we'll feel like we can retire again."

Kim Joseph, 26, of Stewartsville, N.J., received a master's degree in public health in 2006, but has struggled ever since to find a job in her field. She worked for her sister as a nanny before getting a full-time position as an account manager with a marketing solutions company. Last June, she decided to start selling Mary Kay cosmetics on the side, partly to earn extra cash for her upcoming wedding. She now intends to forgo a public health career and eventually sell the makeup line full time.

"I've been able to see how being a consultant gives me room to impact the lives of women," says Joseph, who added that selling Mary Kay also gives her freedom to spend more time with her husband without crimping their household income.

Direct selling is a fluid industry, with only 10% of representatives working "full time," or at least 30 hours a week. Many work only long enough to meet short-term goals, such as holiday presents. But some who work in or watch the industry believe the severity of this recession may cause more sellers to stick with it, even when the economy rebounds, at least as a way to supplement their income.

"I truly believe this has readjusted people's thinking," says Kathy Coover, executive vice president and co-founder of Isagenix. "With this economy, people can't take their jobs for granted anymore. They have to have another alternative … so if something does happen, this is their safety valve."

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Mandatory Celibacy

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Mandatory Celibacy in Catholicism

The story about Fr. Cutie of Miami is big in today’s news and will be for some days. Many in the public do not understand just how such a man came to the decision to accept mandatory celibacy as part of a package deal in order to be ordained in the Latin rite of the Roman Catholic Church.

Enough has been written about the fact that it has been a law for eight hundred years, just a portion of Church history. It will be helpful to compare conditions in 1966 to those of 2009 and then you may understand the generation for Fr. Cutie better.

In 1966 there were enough priests and religious sisters to staff Catholic institutions, including schools. John XXIII had died only a few years before and the Second Vatican Council under Paul VI had just ended. It profoundly influenced those who watched it up close, as we did in our Roman house. After John Paul II took over, the authorities interpreted the words of Vatican II in the spirit of Vatican I. Therefore, strictest orthodoxy and unified practices had to be enforced throughout the Church. The time for creative thinking and experimentation was over.

There came a long period during which John Paul II named bishops that had his spirit, one of total obedience, and the effect upon the people was set aside. He ran the Church somewhat like an army. Bishops lost the newly won authority outlined in Vatican II and became local representatives of the pope, who ruled through the Roman Curia.

Society, however, continued to change. The laity became much more educated, even in theology. Many priests and religious, sisters and brothers, left their old lives to marry. If you praise marriage, as many documents do, and you exalt the dignity of the individual, then forcing people into a package deal for the sake of ordination seems increasingly unwarranted. Old traditions could not be set aside. All the while John Paul II said this was “a man-made law,” on which all agree to this day.

Then there came the scandals of clerical and religious abuse. Many became felons despite their professions. Enough has been written about this in the press. One of my own nieces was a victim. Now, as numbers declined, the work load increased, and priests became more solitary, losing the old-style brotherhood that some might compare to that of the military. Their profession no longer received universal respect. Rather, the public became suspicious. Many lived double lives. Others broke the law.

Meanwhile, certainly under orders from the Vatican, bishops continued in the old practice of transferring problem priests from one location to another without alerting civil authorities. They also retained high-priced lawyers to defect their interests, including monetary ones, and fought litigation that inevitably arouse. Some even dared to intimidate or defame or insult victims themselves. After the fact, many would say that perceptions were different back then or that the matter was mishandled, which nobody disputes. Increasingly, bishops became isolated from the people and even from many priests.

The result: clerical life by the rules became a pressure cooker. Attrition has continued to this day. Morale is low in many places.

All the while, more and more rules are created from scratch to make marrying in the Catholic Church more difficult: a long preparation, and this, sometimes, after the annulment process that can cost $1800 (with the outcome not guaranteed) permitted only in the parish church building, and that can cost $400. Annulments are usually required if either party was married before.

The liturgy doesn’t attract some people so they go to Protestant churches that appeal to them personally, particularly in Latin America these days. Contributions are declining, in any case, and the shift to an Hispanic Church in the United States is marked. Foreign priests are imported to preside at ceremonies and administer sacraments, though many speak English poorly and do not understand the American way of life. They cannot identify with their people nor their people with them.

The rationale for the regulation, of course, is that celibate priests are totally at the disposal of the people, married priests would not be, although Eastern Rite priests can be married, Protestant ministers and Jewish rabbis always have been, and now converts from other church are admitted to the Catholic Church and even to the Catholic clergy: they are ordained Catholic priests and keep their families. There is no longer a danger of alienating Church property by inheritance laws and customs.

But if you are born a Catholic, this path is absolutely, positively forbidden. All laws are said to be sanctioned by God. Authorities are given the benefit of the doubt unless they order people to do something very clearly against the natural law. Subjects must obey, in faith, to be saved.

If you leave, you have no pension, maybe no benefits and no possessions and no secular profession (education was narrow, to keep you from forming a Plan B). 19 years in universities doesn’t guarantee you a living!

Now this situation for priest theologians was often worse, except for the famous, who could get secular jobs through an outstanding resume. These theologians cannot be employed by any Catholic institution at any level. Nor by other faiths because they, understandably, favor their own members. Nor by secular institutions because they typically receive government funds and cannot spend them on religion, under which theology is usually placed.

Their entire education did not allow for a Plan B. Double majors in college were usually disallowed. No secular skills were taught. In Europe these men can sometimes, because of a different Church-State relationship, be fully, professionally employed, but not in America.

What is the outlook? In a word, grim. This generation of bishops was selected by John Paul II. They think and act like him. The present pope continues his policies but sometimes less charismatically. Popes refuse to even discuss mandatory celibacy. Optional celibacy nobody is questioning. How long will the situation last? In Rome they have said that they think in centuries. It is clear that no pastoral emergency is liable to influence them.

So Father Cutie is facing a big choice that many thousands faced before him. Their number world-wide is estimated to be 100,000. No wonder there is a priest shortage. But the people were taught in catechism that Mass and the sacraments were necessary to strength and sustain the faith of their tradition. Father Cutie reminds me of Demosthenes learning oratory while speaking against the waves of the sea. I most certainly wish him happiness and a decision he can live with.

Some condemn him for breaking vows he made under restrictive formation laws. How free had he been in the seminary, humanly speaking? But “he signed on the dotted line” anyway. Let’s leave, as we must, all judgment to God. Let’s pray that the Church does recognize the signs of the times and, to start with, permits an open discussion that could one day lead to serving the pastoral needs of countless millions of Catholics, whose faith has said that they are to be served for the sake of Jesus, the Good Shepherd, and not neglected because of the letter of an old law.

Submitted by Dr James McLellan, Dr theol Member of: http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Power Copy Writing

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Trying To Write Compelling Salescopy? Play To Your Readers' Emotions

From: The Internet Marketing Center Team

If you've been a subscriber to Marketing Tips Report for any length of time, you've probably heard us talk a LOT about the importance of benefits in salescopy. Benefits show -- in detail -- how your product will solve your customers' problems, improve their lives, save them money, and so on. In a nutshell, benefits answer the BIGGEST question on readers' minds: "What's in it for me?"

But how do you know which benefits to focus on? What are people searching for when they type words into a search engine and end up on your sales page? More importantly, why are they searching? (Hint: it's not because they like to spend money on random sites on the Internet!)

The answer to "why" is the secret ingredient that lies at the heart of EVERY successful salesletter: emotional appeal. People don't buy things for rational reasons. They buy for emotional ones. They want to feel good... hopeful... satisfied... proud... relaxed... acknowledged... secure... you get the picture.

If you can identify the underlying emotional needs your product or service satisfies, you can write copy that identifies with your reader in a very intimate way. In a way that says YOU understand them. That you've been there yourself. And that you've found a solution to the very problem their emotions are driving them to solve.

That's powerful stuff. So how can you write emotionally-charged salescopy that connects to your reader? Start by looking at the problem your product solves. What's the underlying emotion it addresses?

Let's say you sell an eBook on 5-minute makeup tips. What problem does your eBook solve? The need to look professional in a hurry and without too much effort? What emotions are being catered to? Pride? Vanity? Laziness? All three?

Out of all human emotions, some are more powerful "sales" drivers than others. So the first step to writing emotionally-charged copy is to identify which "power" emotions are at the core of your product.

Here are seven power emotions that you can tap into, to write salescopy that converts the MAXIMUM number of visitors into paying customers.

Power Emotion #1: Fear of Loss

One of the most powerful human drivers of change is fear. Fear of losing those things that are most important to us. It could be our sense of security that's at stake. Our money. Our health. Or even our happiness. When you identify fear, you can write salescopy that speaks to that emotion, and indicates how your product will overcome that fear.

Here are some examples of copy that recognizes fear and offers a solution to it: "Lose $3,000 tomorrow without this advice…" "Protect your computer from viruses that can wipe out your entire hard drive." "Selling your home? Avoid the top 10 mistakes that can cost you thousands of dollars!" Notice how these examples use words like "protect" and "avoid"? Just as there are power emotions, there are power words that correspond to those emotions!

What are some other power words besides "protect" that correspond to fear? Well, you can try words like: Save Secure Safety Clinch Red flag Defend Keep in mind that when you identify negative emotions like fear, your ultimate goal is to show how your product or service takes away these fears.

Your job is to identify the fear that is there, relate to your reader based on that emotion, then provide relief from that unpleasant emotion. That's why the power words related to fear are positive.

Power Emotion #2: Greed

Greed is another powerful emotion that drives us to take action on our goals. Whether it's our thirst for money, security, fame, recognition, power, or just about anything else that we desire. So how do you acknowledge these desires in your salescopy? And more importantly, how will your product provide them?

Take a look at some examples of copy that does just that: "We'd like to introduce the easiest, simplest, and most efficient proven method for you to make money... This revolutionary method is 100% real and effective, and it will make you increase your income about 90%, so you can make between $100 and $500 a day."

"Club Sportiva gives you the keys to our private multi-million dollar car collection... letting you experience everything from the classics like a Jaguar E-type and Bentley to the newest exotic Ferraris and Lamborghinis." "Tired of scraping by, only buying products if they're on 'sale', living paycheck to paycheck? Discover how to break the cycle once and for all, and start living a life of luxury."

And here are some power words you can use to connect with your readers' inner longing for easy acquisition: All Amass Money Millionaire Monopolize Results Proven

Power Emotion #3: Lust

Lust is perhaps the most pleasurable of the power emotions. And who couldn't use a little more pleasure in their lives? Some examples of salescopy that hand you lust on a platter: "In this section, you will learn a step by step process for how to win the game of love, so that you can immediately begin attracting the love of your life." "Learn the seduction secrets that will make women melt in your hands..." "Are you ready for a night on the town? Your best girl friends -- check! Money for cover charges and one drink -- check! Oh wait -- what to wear? No worries, FlirtCatalog has one of the largest selections of sexy dresses to put your mind at ease!"

Home in on this pleasurable emotion using some of these lustful words Compel Attract Love Delicious Tempting Enticing Charming Discovery Health Tempt

Of course, people can lust after things as well as people (like a Lamborghini!). So keep in mind that your product doesn't have to be focused on "getting the girl" or other types of people-related lust.

Power Emotion #4: Vanity

If your product caters to people's vanity -- pride in their appearance, abilities, and achievements reflected back by others -- you're in luck. It's another top-selling emotion. "If you want to be one of those women who always looks great no matter what you're wearing, no matter what your age...and even if you're not at your "ideal weight," then this will be the most important letter you've ever read." "In the last 10 years, we've helped thousands of men and women of all ages and fitness levels to look and feel their very best -- people just like YOU!"

In fact, whole industries are built around this need to look and feel our best. Let's face it. We can all use a boost sometime. And those products that appeal to our vanity can provide them. Some other vanity power words include: Attractive Confident Magnetic Younger Stronger Beautiful You

Think about how your product or service caters to this power emotion... image consulting, exercise equipment, cosmetics, laser eye surgery, baldness cures... the list goes on.

Power Emotion #5: Pride

Do you feel pleasure when you know you've done something well? Feeling good about your accomplishments is what pride's all about. To connect with pride, your ultimate goal is to show how your product will provide a sense of worth or accomplishment.

Let's take a look at a couple of examples: "Would You Want Your Name Written In The 'Largemouth BASS' Hall Of FAME? What if I could show you insider up-to-date secret techniques that will put your name in the history records like the old-school stars -- Kevin VanDam, Denny Brauer and Gary Klein?" "Now You Can Transform Ordinary Fabric Into a Handmade Quilt That Your Family and Friends Will Love, Admire and Cherish – Even If You Have Never Made a Quilt Before!" "Transform the book idea in your head into a completed and ready-to-publish manuscript in your hands."

The opportunities for identifying with pride are endless! Your pride power-words: Accomplish Master Transform Best Biggest Greatest Money Proven Results Envy

Power Emotion #6: Envy

You've worked hard all your life, but you're not even close to making that 6-figure salary you thought you'd be making by now. But it seems every time you turn around, there's someone else who is. Ah, envy. Whether you've got it for someone else or you want others to envy YOU, it's a powerful emotion. And it's one of the top instigators of change.

Envy is the state of seeing others who have what YOU want. So if you're going to identify with envy, you need to be prepared to tell them how your product will give them what they're lacking. In a word, your copy needs to promise fulfillment.

Testimonials, examples, and personal stories inspire envy -- and give inspiration to take further action: "Your buddies will be AMAZED at your LUCK or so it would seem... If they only knew what you're about to discover..." "I was working a corporate job for almost 9 years. Finally I had it when my salary was cut by 30%... Today my life is drastically different. I work out of my home office in NYC. I gave up the suit for jeans, sweats and shorts. And I spend most of my day doing what I love: working out, shopping, volunteering and walking my dog Cheila. And I have already tripled my income this year working this business 20-25 hours a week."

"Desperate Scrawny "Nerd" From Texas Humiliates The "Big Boys" At The Gym After Accidentally Discovering The Body's Hidden Natural "Trigger" For Blasting Through Rotten Genetics And Packing On Up To 3 - 6 - Even 9 INCHES Of Shredded Muscle...NOT In Years...But Just WEEKS!"

Here are some envy power words you can use: Desire Covet Begrudge Secret Ordinary Extraordinary People just like you

Just remember, envy is only a negative emotion if it doesn't prompt someone to take concrete steps to change whatever it is about their lives that isn't working for them.

And if your product can provide those steps, your customers need to know about it! But first you have to capture their attention... by using genuine testimonials or personal anecdotes you can inspire a little envy, then go on to describe how your reader can achieve the same enviable state!

Power Emotion #7: Laziness

These days, there are a lot of things competing for our time and attention. Family, work, hobbies, giving back to the community... the list goes on and on. So products that can provide quick results with minimal effort are extremely appealing.That's where laziness comes into play.

Laziness is the need for maximum results with minimum effort. And its allure is powerful. Here are some examples of "lazy" copy: "Avoid the common fitness mistakes that waste your time.""How would you like to write your book in 3 days? Attend my Author's Boot Camp and get that book that you know is inside you out of your head and onto the paper in one weekend."

Your lazy power words: Instant access Save time In less than Break-neck speed Lightning Easy Guaranteed Roadmap Blueprint Avoid mistakes

Those are the top 7 power-emotions in a nutshell. Did you notice that salescopy from the same website came up in a couple of examples? For instance, the examples about writing a book covered laziness AND pride. Most copy will cater to more than just one type of emotion. And there are natural combinations of these emotions, too: pride, laziness, and greed; fear, pride, and vanity; or envy, vanity, and laziness, for example.

So by all means, choose two or three to highlight throughout your copy and sales process. In general, any more than that, and your copy won't be as focused or effective as it should. But remember, emotion is the element that will turbo-charge your salescopy, so think -- and FEEL -- like your potential customers.

By: The Internet Marketing Center Team Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

People Cut Back During a Recession

Survey: Americans reclassifying luxury, necessity in recession By Sharon Jayson, USA TODAY A few years back, the list of "gotta-haves" for many Americans included a car, TV, microwave, home air conditioning and dishwasher. Now, not so much. A Pew Research Center survey released Thursday finds that the recession has changed Americans' minds about many items that used to seen as necessities. AMERICAN DREAM: Going from thriving to struggling leads many to redefine it. In a 2006 Pew survey of luxuries and necessities, 68% said a microwave was a necessity; now that's 47%. And 52% say a TV is a necessity today, down from 64% in 2006. "Societal conditions have changed," says James Burroughs, associate professor of commerce at the University of Virginia-Charlottesville. "In many ways, luxuries are things that are learned in response to a changing environment." The survey of 1,003 Americans April 2-8 by telephone and cellphone finds that appliances such as a dishwasher or clothes dryer are now considered more discretionary. Just 21% (down from 35%) say a dishwasher is a necessity, and 66% say the same for a dryer (down from 83%). Still, the dryer ranked second on the necessity list in 2006 and 2009, following the car, which topped the list both years (91% in 2006, 88% today). Pew researchers also asked about behavior changes amid the struggling economy and how much Americans' lives have been affected: 27% report they or someone in their household had lost a job or been laid off in the past year. 80% have cut back. 20% say they're doing more work in and around their homes. "Regardless of age, gender, education and other social or economic characteristics, the change in attitudes toward these consumer goods has occurred quickly and broadly," the report says. It also found technology is more indispensable: Cellphones and high-speed Internet access are as necessary or more necessary as they were three years ago. About half (49%) of those surveyed this month say cellphones are a necessity, the same as in 2006. But high-speed Internet picked up 2 percentage points, to 31%. One factor may be that the lines between work and home are blurring, says Stephen Sweet, associate sociology professor at Ithaca (N.Y.) College. He says many employees are expected to be reachable anytime, work at home when necessary and sometimes bring children to the office. "That explains some of the reasons we're viewing new technology in certain ways," he says. So is materialism losing its allure? "I think we are still a very materialistic society," Burroughs says. "But there has been a sort of small trend toward being a little bit more introspective about materialism and consumption." Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Cyber Gangs Break Codes on Social Sites

Cybergangs use cheap labor to break codes on social sites

By Byron Acohido, USA TODAY

SEATTLE — It's become the new front in cybercrime: scams and identity-theft programs that attack

such as Facebook and MySpace. To carry out many of these automated attacks, cybercriminals first must overcome "captchas," the distorted letters and characters that users of an e-mail or social-networking account are required to type to complete certain online forms.

For years, captchas have helped to stop or bog down automated programs aimed at creating, among other things, e-mail accounts that promote scams such as fake computer virus protection and bogus accounts on social websites that can be used to collect personal information on legitimate users.Now, security specialists say, a growing number of captcha-breaking groups are using real people to type in captcha responses for cybergangs around the world. This is allowing the gangs to create fake e-mail and social-network accounts by the tens of thousands — and use them as the starting point for a variety of cyberscams spread by e-mail and instant messages.

MySpace and Facebook say that, so far, they have kept such attacks largely in check. But security researchers say that as long as captchas are a key security feature on networking websites, cyberattacks on such sites are likely to intensify."We shouldn't have any illusions about captchas," says Sergei Shevchenko, a virus hunter at Internet security firm PC Tools. "If the professionals want to break in, they'll do it." For social-networking sites that have exploded in popularity during the past two years — Facebook now claims more than 200 million members — the stakes are enormous.

The social networks, scrambling to build audiences and ad revenue, want to avoid e-mail's fate: Today, 90% of all e-mail traffic is spam, and companies across the nation pour vast resources into keeping legitimate e-mail viable by filtering away spam.

Meanwhile, cybergangs recognize the opportunity to get fresh mileage from tried-and-true scams. They are repurposing ruses perfected in e-mail spamming to try to fool members of social networks into accepting — or even spreading — ads for fake products, data-stealing programs and other harmful computer bugs. "Social-networking sites are a viral marketer's dream," says Paul Wood, analyst at Message Labs-Symantec, an Internet security firm. "The potential to tap into a huge community of like-minded individuals is enormous."

A penny at a time

Captchas first appeared in 2001. They are based on the idea that humans — and not automated programs used by cybercriminals — can distinguish a word or group of characters shown as a warped graphical representation and then type them on an online form to gain access to a protected Web page.Social networks typically require captchas for creating accounts and sending private messages that include Web links.

Captchas represent the first line of deterrence against automated programs, called bots, which typically are assembled in large groups known as botnets. Bots are the little engines that propel online criminal activities. Bots, for example, are efficient at creating bogus Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo and AOL messaging accounts, as well as memberships on MySpace, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. These bogus accounts can serve as launching points to spread spam, steal data, pitch fake antivirus subscriptions — and scoop more PCs into the botnet.

Captcha designers have made their work increasingly distorted and camouflaged to defeat improved character-recognition programs carried by bots. Today, most major websites use advanced captchas that bots can't resolve. Enter captcha-breaking groups, bearing a new weapon that combines cheap labor with the Internet's capacity for quick, anonymous global transactions.

Spawned in the online underground, these groups are difficult to pin down, security specialists say. But based on recruitment ads, discussions on hackers' forums and the rising volume of bogus accounts being created, there appear to be dozens of captcha-breaking gangs employing hundreds of people in several countries, tech security researchers say.

Human captcha-solvers work piecemeal. They have shown up in Internet cafes or in sweatshops filled with Internet-connected PCs in China, India, Russia, Brazil, Argentina and Nigeria, working long shifts deciphering streams of characters forwarded by an unseen coordinator, researchers say.

"At least one major operation is being run out of Pakistan," says Adam O'Donnell, director of emerging technologies at messaging security firm Cloudmark. "I suspect similar operations are being run anywhere that has bandwidth and cheap labor."Cybergangs typically pay captcha-solvers a half-cent to a penny for every captcha they complete, according to online recruitment ads on hackers' forums that reflect how captcha-solving has become a growing underground business.

"You can pay a business for captcha-breaking services, and they'll make it happen," says Patrick Peterson, chief security researcher at Cisco. "You can have the captchas solved in the Internet cloud as you create each new account."

Networks fight back

Without the emergence of for-hire captcha-breakers, a particularly destructive worm that plagued the Internet in May — known as Koobface — would not have been possible. A worm is a program designed to self-replicate across the Internet.

Koobface — a cockeyed spelling of Facebook — targeted MySpace and Facebook. It initiated messages that duped victims into clicking on a Web link to view a funny YouTube video. Clicking on the link led to instructions to download a Flash Player update required to view the video. Clicking on the video player update downloaded a copy of the worm, which instantly searched out the victim's friend lists on Facebook and MySpace and sent copies of itself to everyone on the list. So, subsequent victims received a message that actually arrived from the account of a trusted friend.

"This certainly represented the sullying of what began as a clear, worry-free place to interact with peers," says Joel Smith, chief technology officer at messaging security firm AppRiver. MySpace and Facebook scrambled to warn users about Koobface, block suspicious Web links and take other defensive measures.

"We've been working for months to limit the distribution of Koobface over Facebook," says Facebook spokesman Barry Schnitt. "We take the security of our users very seriously and have invested significant resources in protecting them."

MySpace Chief Security Officer Hemanshu Nigam says improved security has reduced spam that reaches the network's members by 73% since Koobface first appeared. MySpace beefed up its message-filtering systems and developed a tool to warn members about suspicious links.

"We have put in a lot of features to cleanse things like Koobface," Nigam says. Researchers don't know who created or controls Koobface, which continues to morph on the Web. In mid-March, Microsoft added Koobface detection to its Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT), which automatically checks PCs running non-pirated copies of Windows Vista, Windows XP, Windows 2000 and Windows Server 2003 for more than 100 viruses.

In the ensuing two weeks, MSRT removed Koobface nearly 200,000 times from 133,677 PCs. "Koobface is constantly changing to avoid detection, with over 20,000 variations to date," Jeff Williams, Microsoft Malware Protection Center program manager, said in a blog post. "We're also working to detect new variants of the Koobface virus as they're discovered, so we can provide ongoing protection from this threat."

A 'shark' in 'warm waters'

Early versions of Koobface focused on spreading the worm far and wide. Besides copying itself to everyone on victims' friend lists, the worm stole cookies — small pieces of text, stored in the users' Web browsers. But it stole only those cookies that contained user IDs and passwords for members of social-networking sites Friendster, BlackPlanet, Bebo, Hi5, LiveJournal and MyYearbook. That gave the attackers starting points to launch the worm in the more popular social networks, says Kurt Baumgartner, chief threat officer at PC Tools.

As Koobface steadily added capabilities, Baumgartner observed it begin to incorporate malicious programs widely used by other criminal groups: Adware for a $50 fake antivirus program, called Security Protect 2009, that's now also being spread by the Conficker worm. Coding that turns an infected PC into a spam-spreading bot, the same coding used by the huge Waledac e-mail virus. A program called ZeuS that steals user IDs and passwords from a customizable list of banks.

"Koobface is like a shark that has found itself in warm waters with plenty of prey," Baumgartner says. Monitoring Koobface with Baumgartner has been colleague Shevchenko, a Russian expatriate. Shevchenko made some startling discoveries about captcha breakers. Monitoring Russian-language forums, he found an ad headlined "Kolotibablo," which means "make easy money."

The job description as translated by Shevchenko: "Your new job is printing English text that you see in the pictures. (Images of captchas were shown.) All you need is to know English alphabet and know where the keys are located on a keyboard. For every correctly entered word you will receive up to 1 cent, depending on the level that you have achieved. Your only limit is your typing speed. Every minute, you'll be able to correctly type the text from 10 pictures on average. Thus, with an average price of 0.5 cent per one correctly typed text from a picture, your salary will be 3 US dollars per hour."

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Alder People Like Facebook

All in the Facebook family: older generations join social networks

By John D. Sutter CNN

(CNN) -- Penny Ireland's family is so scattered around the world that Facebook, the popular social networking site, has become the family's No. 1 way to communicate. The fastest-growing age group on Facebook is women older than 55, Inside Facebook says.

"We call it our living room," the 56-year-old mother said by phone from her home in Houston, Texas. "Everybody can tell what everybody else is doing." "Everybody" includes Ireland's five kids and her 83-year-old mother, who has a Facebook profile she accesses daily, Ireland said.

While online social networks like Facebook, Twitter and MySpace are known hang-outs for younger adults and teenagers, older generations in recent months have been taking to the medium at a faster rate than any other age group, according to industry reports.

Many of these older folks use social networks to keep tabs on younger family members and they often find fruitful connections with their peers after they've friended all of their kids and grandkids, according to an informal survey by Stanford University professor BJ Fogg. Join a conversation on this topic at CNN's Facebook page.

The trend is still relatively confined. Only about 7 percent of people older than 65 have online social-networking profiles, according to research from the Pew Internet & American Life Project. But Facebook's popularity is growing most quickly among women older than 55, according to a site called Inside Facebook, which tracks Facebook's growth.

There are now about 1.5 million female users older than 55 on the site, the group says -- roughly a 550 percent increase over six months ago. By comparison, membership among people younger than 25 grew by less than 20 percent over the same period, Inside Facebook says.

Facebook now says it has 200 million users, making its user base larger than the populations of all the world's countries except China, India, the United States and Indonesia. Such a vast presence, coupled with news media buzz about all social media, has pushed online social networking to a "tipping point," said Amanda Lenhart, a senior research specialist at the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

Fogg, the Stanford instructor, said the trend has spread outward from college towns, where Facebook was first adopted, and inward from the American coasts. Facebook today has a global presence, with 70 percent of users living outside the U.S., the site says.

"We've reached critical mass where there's been enough talk about Facebook and people have gotten so many invitations from their friends, they're going, 'OK, what is this Facebook thing? I've got to get onboard or I'm going to be left in the dust,' " Fogg said.

Parents who are interested in their kids' online activities contribute to the sharp increase in older users on Facebook, said Linda Fogg-Phillips, a 49-year-old who, with her brother, co-taught a six-week class at Stanford called "Facebook for Parents."

"Parents are finally at the point where they realize this is not going away. They better figure out how to get on it and they'd better figure out how to use it," said Fogg-Phillips, who is a mother of eight in Las Vegas, Nevada. "It's a snowball effect. It's viral in a good sense."

Older people often must overcome fears about privacy issues before they will join Facebook, Fogg-Phillips said. Once they do, they often find unexpected uses for the network, she said. iReport.com: Facebook, Twitter growing pains? That was the case for Craig Costa, a 55-year-old fly-fishing guide in Park City, Utah, who said family members forced him to join Facebook.

Costa still finds parts of the site annoying, and isn't comfortable having his personal information made public, but he has connected with old friends he wouldn't have otherwise -- including his ex-wife, who now is a Facebook friend of his current wife. "It's been really interesting because so many people have a connection to me," he said. "I was married before and my wife is now talking to my ex-wife. And some of her old friends are telling old stories about me to my wife. It's just bizarre for me."

Costa said he also can more easily keep up with his 28-year-old son, who lives in New York and also keeps a Facebook page for his dog. Karen Essman, 61, uses Facebook but said she has trouble convincing her peers to join social-networking sites. They often don't understand the interface or are afraid of scams, she said. "It's a little bit more difficult for older people," she said.

Margaret Brooks, 63, of Idaho Falls, Idaho, joined the site because there was no other place for her to see her 18-year-old grandson's artwork. She asked to be his friend online, and at first she worried he wouldn't respond."I did think, 'Oh my goodness, I'm old grandma. He doesn't want to have anything to do with grandma on Facebook,' " she said. "But he did, and every time I send something to him he sends something to me." Joanne Woeppel joined Facebook so she could keep tabs on her 13 grandkids.

But the Web site also has helped the 71-year-old keep up with other people without changing her routine. "I'm pretty much what you would call a loner. I'm content in my own company. I can find things to do to entertain myself that I don't need to be out and about," she said by phone from her three-bedroom house near Dallas, Texas. "I don't go out to socialize."

A former call center worker and aspiring sci-fi author, Woeppel visits the online social network about once a day. Spending time on Facebook, which she joined in September, helps her feel connected to family all over the country -- especially to the youngsters, she said. She has family members who live nearby, but says she's found a way to communicate with them in their own language through Facebook.

"Let's face it, kids that age aren't really interested in talking to people my age very much. It's more, 'Hi grandma how are ya? ... Bye!' " she said with a laugh. "That's basically what I get from my grandkids, so if I can engage them through just a little bit of chit-chat [online], it's a lot more than I can get over the phone."

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Army Recruiter Suicides

Part Two

Thursday, Apr. 02, 2009 TIME

Why Are Army Recruiters Killing Themselves?

By MARK THOMPSON Inflated Requirements

The way things rolled in Houston, it turns out, was especially harsh. Until recently, the Army told prospective recruiters they'd be expected to sign up two recruits a month. "All of your training is geared toward prospecting for and processing at least two enlistments monthly," the Army said on its Recruit the Recruiter website until TIME called to ask about the requirement. Major General Thomas Bostick, USAREC's top general, sent out a 2006 letter declaring that each recruiter "Must Do Two." But if each recruiter did that, the Army would be flooded with more than 180,000 recruits a year instead of the 80,000 it needs. In fact, the real target per recruiter is closer to one a month. Yet the constant drumbeat for two continued.

The Houston battalion's punishing work hours were also beyond what was expected. In June 2007, Bostick issued a written order to the 5th Recruiting Brigade and its Houston battalion requiring commanders to clarify the battalion's fuzzy work-hour policy, which could be read as requiring 13-hour workdays. He demanded a new policy "consistent with law and regulation." The brigade and battalion commanders ignored the order.

By mid-2008, a Houston battalion commander complained to subordinates of "getting numerous calls on recruiters being called 'dirtbags' or 'useless' when they do not accomplish mission each month." He'd heard that recruiters who had been promised birthdays or anniversaries off were being "called back to work on the day of the anniversary and during the birthday and/or anniversary party when they already had family and friends at their homes." To improve morale, the battalion's leadership decided to hold a picnic last July 26. "Family fun is mandatory," read an internal e-mail.

Crying Like a Child

Staff Sergeant Flores, a married father of two, who'd looked so haggard last August, was the station commander overseeing the pair of recruiting offices in Nacogdoches. The job required the veteran of both Afghanistan and Iraq to dial into two daily conference calls from his office at 7 a.m. and 10 p.m. "On a regular basis, he would complain to me that the 15 to 19 hours we worked daily were too much," a colleague told Army investigators.

When Flores' station failed to make mission, his superiors ordered him to attend what the Army calls "low-production training" in Houston on Saturday, Aug. 2. "When you're getting home at 11 and getting up at 4, it's tough, but it's the dressing down that really got to him," says a recruiter who worked alongside Flores. "They had him crying like a kid in the office, telling him he was no good and that they were going to pull his stripes."

Flores, 26, was told his failure as a station commander meant he'd soon be returning to a basic recruiter's slot. "He was an emotional wreck," said a soldier who spoke with him the evening of Aug. 8. "He said he felt he failed as a station commander," the colleague told investigators. "He had asked me for a firearm. I told him I didn't have one. It actually never crossed my mind that it might have been for himself." Flores hanged himself that night. "The leadership is the major cause for SFC Flores taking his own life, he was a prideful soldier," a fellow station commander wrote in a statement, carefully noting Flores' posthumous promotion. "I believe this was a snap decision because SFC Flores stated to me that he grew up without a father and he would never do that to his kids."

Amanda Henderson had worked alongside Flores in Nacogdoches. Her husband, Sergeant First Class Patrick Henderson, 35, served at a recruiting office 90 minutes away in Longview. Patrick met Amanda at recruiting school after a combat tour in Iraq, and they married in January 2008. With their new jobs, though, "there was no time for family life at all," Amanda says. While Patrick didn't want the assignment, his widow says, the Army told him he had no choice. He masked his disappointment behind a friendly demeanor and an easy smile.

But things got worse after Flores' death. "He just kept saying it was the battalion's fault because of this big bashing session that had taken place" six days before Flores killed himself, Amanda says. "I can't tell you how mad he got at the Army when Flores committed suicide." Two weeks later, Patrick spoke of killing himself and was embarrassed by the fuss it kicked up. "He started to get reclusive," Amanda says now.

"He sounded pretty beat up," a fellow recruiter told investigators later. "He seemed to be upset about recruiting and didn't want to be out here." Patrick was taken off frontline recruiting and assigned to company headquarters. But it didn't stop his downward spiral. The day after a squabble with his wife on Sept. 19, Patrick hanged himself.

A Senator Demands Answers

It wasn't until reports in the Houston Chronicle provoked Republican Senator John Cornyn of Texas to demand answers that the Army launched an investigation into the string of suicides. "It's tragic that it took four deaths to bring this to the attention of a U.S. Senator and to ask for a formal investigation," Cornyn says. After Cornyn began asking questions, the Army ordered Brigadier General F.D. Turner to investigate. Recruiters told him that their task is a "stressful, challenging job that is driven wholly by production, that is, the numbers of people put into the Army each month," Turner disclosed Dec. 23 after a two-month probe.

The report found that morale was particularly low in the Houston battalion. Its top officer and enlisted member — Lieut. Colonel Toimu Reeves and Command Sergeant Major Cheryl Broussard — are no longer with the unit. (He left for another post in USAREC; she was removed from her post until an investigation into her role is finished, and she is working in the San Antonio Recruiting Battalion.)

In an interview, General Turner would not discuss the personal lives of the victims, but his report noted that all four were in "failed or failing" relationships. Yet he conceded that "the work environment might have been relevant in their relationship problems." The claim of a failing relationship is denied by Amanda Henderson and by testimony from fellow recruiters. And an Army crisis-response team dispatched to Houston in October to look into last summer's two suicides cited a poor work environment — not domestic issues — as key.

After Turner's report, Lieut. General Benjamin Freakley, head of the Army Accessions Command that oversees USAREC, asked the Army inspector general to conduct a nationwide survey of the mood among Army recruiters.

The Army also ordered a one-day stand-down for all recruiters in February so it could focus on proper leadership and suicide prevention. The worsening economy is already easing some of the recruiters' burden, as is the raising of the maximum enlistment age, from 35 to 42. But with only 3 in 10 young Americans meeting the mental, moral and physical requirements to serve, recruiting challenges will continue.

Amanda Henderson, who lost both her husband and her boss to suicide last year, has left that battlefield. "The Army didn't take care of my husband or Sergeant Flores the way they needed to," she says. Though still in the Army, she has quit recruiting and returned to her former job as a supply sergeant at Fort Jackson. Because of the poor economy, she says, she plans to stay in uniform at least until her current enlistment is up in 2011. "Some days I say I've just got to go on," she says. "Other days I'll just sit and cry all day long."

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Army|Recruiter|Suicides|Pressure

Thursday, Apr. 02, 2009 TIME

Part I

Why Are Army Recruiters Killing Themselves?

By MARK THOMPSON

When Army Staff Sergeant Amanda Henderson ran into Staff Sergeant Larry Flores in their Texas recruiting station last August, she was shocked by the dark circles under his eyes and his ragged appearance. "Are you O.K.?" she asked the normally squared-away soldier. "Sergeant Henderson, I am just really tired," he replied. "I had such a bad, long week, it was ridiculous." The previous Saturday, Flores' commanders had berated him for poor performance. He had worked every day since from 6:30 a.m. to 10 p.m., trying to persuade the youth of Nacogdoches to wear Army green. "But I'm O.K.," he told her.

No, he wasn't. Later that night, Flores hanged himself in his garage with an extension cord. Henderson and her husband Patrick, both Army recruiters, were stunned. "I'll never forget sitting there at Sergeant Flores' memorial service with my husband and seeing his wife crying," Amanda recalls. "I remember looking over at Patrick and going, 'Why did he do this to her? Why did he do this to his children?' " Patrick didn't say anything, and Amanda now says Flores' suicide "triggered" something in her husband. Six weeks later, Patrick hanged himself with a dog chain in their backyard shed.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are now the longest waged by an all-volunteer force in U.S. history. Even as soldiers rotate back into the field for multiple and extended tours, the Army requires a constant supply of new recruits. But the patriotic fervor that led so many to sign up after 9/11 is now eight years past. That leaves recruiters with perhaps the toughest, if not the most dangerous, job in the Army. Last year alone, the number of recruiters who killed themselves was triple the overall Army rate. Like posttraumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury, recruiter suicides are a hidden cost of the nation's wars.

The Wartime Challenge

Behind the neat desks and patriotic posters in 1,650 Army recruiting stations on Main Streets and in strip malls is a work environment as stressful in its own way as combat. The hours are long, time off is rare, and the demand to sign up at least two recruits a month is unrelenting. Soldiers who have returned from tours in Iraq and Afghanistan now constitute 73% of recruiters, up from 38% in 2005. And for many of them, the pressure is just too much. "These kids are coming back from Iraq with problems," says a former Army officer who recently worked in the Houston Recruiting Battalion.

The responsibility for providing troop replacements falls to the senior noncommissioned officers who have chosen to make recruiting their career in the U.S. Army Recruiting Command (USAREC). They in turn put pressure on their local recruiters to "make mission" and generate the recruits — sometimes by any means necessary. Lawrence Kagawa retired last July after more than 20 years in uniform; he spent the latter half as a highly decorated recruiter, and his tenure included a stint in the Houston battalion from 2002 to 2005. "There's one set of values for the Army, and when you go to Recruiting Command, you're basically forced to do things outside of what would normally be considered to be moral or ethical," he says.

Because station commanders and their bosses are rated on how well their subordinates recruit, there is a strong incentive to cut corners to bring in enlistees. If recruiters can't make mission legitimately, their superiors will tell them to push the envelope. "You'll be told to call Johnny or Susan and tell them to lie and say they've never had asthma like they told you, that they don't have a juvenile criminal history," Kagawa says. "That recruiter is going to bend the rules and get the lies told and process the fraudulent paperwork." And if the recruiter refuses? The commander, says Kagawa, is "going to tell you point-blank that 'we have a loyalty issue here, and if I give you a "no" for loyalty on your annual report, your career is over.' "

It's not surprising, then, that some recruiters ignore red flags to enlist marginal candidates. "I've seen [recruiters] make kids drink gallons of water trying to flush marijuana out of their system before they take their physicals," one Houston recruiter says privately. "I've seen them forge signatures." Sign up a pair of enlistees in a month and a recruiter is hailed; sign up none and he can be ordered to monthly Saturday sessions, where he is verbally pounded for his failure.

The military isn't known for treating underperformers with kid gloves. But the discipline can be harder for recruiters to take because they are, in most cases, physically and socially isolated. Unlike most soldiers, who are assigned to posts where they and their families receive the Army's full roster of benefits, 70% of Army recruiters live more than 50 miles (80 km) from the nearest military installation. Lacking local support, recruiters and their spouses turn to Internet message boards. "I hate to say it, but all the horror stories are true!" a veteran Army recruiter advised a rookie online. "It will be three years of hell on you and your family." One wife wrote that instead of coming home at the end of a long workday, her husband was headed "to Super Wal-Mart to find prospects because they're open for 24 hours."

Today's active-duty Army recruiting force is 7,600-strong. Soldiers attend school at Fort Jackson, S.C., for seven weeks before being sent to one of the 38 recruiting battalions across the nation. There they spend their days calling lists of high school seniors and other prospects and visiting schools and malls. At night, they visit the homes of potential recruits to sell them on one of the Army's 150 different jobs and seal the deal with hefty enlistment bonuses: up to $40,000 in cash and as much as $65,000 for college. The manual issued to recruiting commanders warns that, unlike war, in recruiting there will be no victory "until such time when the United States no longer requires an Army." Recruiting must "continue virtually nonstop" and is "aggressive, persistent and unrelenting."

Lone Star Losses

Nowhere has the pace been more punishing than inside the Houston Recruiting Battalion. One of every 10 of the Army's recruits last year came from Texas — the highest share of any state — and recruiters in Harris County enlisted 1,104, just 37 shy of first-place Phoenix's Maricopa County. The Houston unit's nearly 300 recruiters are spread among 49 stations across southeast Texas. Since 2005, four members recently back from Iraq or Afghanistan have committed suicide while struggling, as recruiters say, to "put 'em in boots." TIME has obtained a copy of the Army's recently completed 2-inch-thick (50 mm) report of the investigation into the Houston suicides.

Its bottom line: recruiters there have toiled under a "poor command climate" and an "unhealthy and singular focus on production at the expense of soldier and family considerations." Most names have been deleted; the Army said those who were blamed by recruiters for the poor work environment didn't want to comment. While some recruiters were willing to talk to TIME, most declined to be named for fear of risking their careers.

Captain Rico Robinson, 32, the Houston battalion's personnel officer, was the first suicide, shooting himself in January 2005. But one of his predecessors, Christina Montalvo, had tried to kill herself a few years earlier, gulping a handful of prescription sleeping pills in a suicide attempt that was thwarted when a co-worker found her. Montalvo says a boss bullied her about her weight. And she was shocked by the abuse that senior sergeants routinely levied on subordinates. "I'd never been in a unit before where soldiers publicly humiliated other soldiers," says Montalvo, who left the Army in 2002 after 16 years. "If they don't make mission, they're humiliated and embarrassed."

Several months after Robinson committed suicide, Staff Sergeant Nils Aron Andersson arrived in Houston as a recruiter. Andersson had served two tours in Iraq with the 82nd Airborne and had won a Bronze Star for helping buddies pinned down in a firefight. "I asked him what he did to get it, and he just looked right at me and said, 'Doing my job, Dad, just doing my job,' and that's all he ever said," says his father Robert of Springfield, Ore. "He wouldn't talk to me about Iraq."

Aron, as he was known, had changed in Iraq. Perhaps it was the September 2003 night he gave up his exposed seat in a Black Hawk helicopter to a younger soldier who wanted the thrill of sitting there and who ended up being the only one killed when the chopper flipped on takeoff. Or maybe it was the day Andersson's squad had to destroy a speeding suicide van headed straight at their checkpoint, despite the women and children inside. Instead of returning for a third tour, Andersson chose recruiting. He trained at Fort Jackson, filed for divorce and joined the Houston battalion in 2005. "They were working the crap out of him," Robert says. "I'd get calls from him at 9:30 at night — 11:30 in Houston — and he'd say he was just leaving the recruiting office and starting on his 40-minute drive home." His easygoing son also developed a hair-trigger temper during his time at the River Oaks and Rosenberg recruiting stations. "He wasn't really a salesman," Robert says, "and recruiters are trying to sell something."

Several months into the job, Aron threatened suicide in front of a girlfriend. After Army doctors cleared him, he returned to work. "For the two years he was in Iraq, I'd turn down the street and be terrified there'd be a car with a set of government plates on it when I got home telling me that he'd been killed," his father says. "Suicide was the last scenario I'd ever come up with."

But that was what occurred on March 5, 2007. In the week before his suicide, Andersson was ordered to write three separate essays explaining his failure to line up prospective recruits. A fellow recruiter later told Army investigators that commanders "humiliated" this decorated battlefield soldier during a training session: "He was under a constant grind — incredible pressure. He just became numb."

Andersson, 25, stopped by his recruiting station hours before he died and said he had gotten married that morning to Cassy Walton, whom he had recently met. He seemed in a good mood. "Before leaving, he played a prank on the station commander that made everyone laugh," a fellow recruiter told investigators. But the newlyweds argued that night, and Andersson, inside his new Ford pickup, put the barrel of a Ruger .22-cal. pistol to his right temple and squeezed the trigger. His widow, suffering from psychiatric problems of her own, killed herself the next day with a gun she had just bought.

"That double suicide should have stopped everything," an officer who was in the battalion says privately. Instead, he reports, the leadership in Houston said, "We're just going to keep rolling the way we've been rolling."

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Brain Power Evolves

Smart people may be less stressed

Smarts matter in our high-tech age of standardized tests, iPhone entrepreneurs and nanotech venture capitalists. "The future is built on brains, not prom court, as most people can tell you after attending their high school reunion," as the writer Anna Quindlen, puts it.

But how smart are we about smarts? Not too smart, suggests some looks at the science behind intelligence and achievement. "Family income is a strong and consistent predictor," of test scores, school grades and education, say a Cornell University study in the current Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal. "The longer the childhood exposure to poverty, the worse the achievement levels become."

Although a "large, robust literature" stretching back more than a decade describes this observation, study authors Gary Evans and Michelle Schamberg note there is no biological explanation for it. Why does poverty have this effect? To find an answer, the pair looked at 195 men who were part of a long-term study of rural poverty. The study included health records and income. In 2006, about 22% of all children nationwide lived below the poverty line, living on less than $21,200 for a family of four, according to the federal Department of Health and Human Services. (About 18% of people worldwide live below the international poverty line of $1 a day, according to Princeton economist Alan Krueger.)

At age 17, all of the men in the study had their " working memory," the short-term ability to remember things briefly, assessed. Intelligence tests and grades more typically test longer-term memories, measuring knowledge."The proportion of early childhood spent in poverty is also significantly related to working memory," finds the study, perhaps not surprising. But when the researchers went back and looked at the men's health records, the relationship between poverty and memory dissolved, revealing their health — as reflected in blood pressure, obesity and stress hormone measures — are factored in. What looks like an income effect is actually a public health problem.

Stress hormones over time are widely known to interfere with memory, an effect described in neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky's popular science book, Why Zebra's Don't Get Ulcers. Chronic stress alters brain chemistry, damaging a part of the brain called the hippocampus, central to memory formation. Although the study can't go back in time to look inside the brains of the young men in the study, the researchers suggest something similar likely occurred to them.

Brain chemistry aside, simply assessing intelligence remains a controversial topic, particularly widely-used "intelligence quotient" or IQ tests. The so-called " Flynn Effect," the 1994 observation by New Zealand researcherJames Flynn that IQ scores have risen from generation to generation for every country ever studied, with the gains coming not from vocabulary, math or other school topics, but in abstract thinking. Some researchers, such as Richard Lynn of the University of Ulster, suggest the tests are worthwhile, however, pointing to improved nutrition among the poor in societies as driving the IQ increases.

"The 20th Century has seen both massive height gains and massive IQ gains," Flynn himself notes in a study in the current Economics & Human Biology journal an argument for the nutrition explanation for IQ gains. But looking at diet and IQ scores in the United Kingdom from 1938 to 2008, he suggests, knocks the legs out from under that explanation.

In the study, Flynn looked at schoolchildren measured in 1938, 1947, 1982 and 2008, showing 11-year-olds in that time averaged a 15.6 IQ-point-gain during that 70-year period. The biggest jump took place between 1938 and 1947. However the gains were much more pronounced among wealthier kids than poorer ones, "which would imply that the upper classes made larger dietary gains than the lower classes as we go into the more distant past," Flynn writes, which he finds unlikely.

Instead he argues, "During the 20th Century, society evolved and therefore, set new cognitive problems that made us think differently than we did at its beginning." The modern world demands its inhabitants deal with abstractions, so we do better with abstract test questions now, Flynn argues, rather than being any smarter. Doubtless, debate over the roots of intelligence will continue. After all, "Ideas are like pizza dough, made to be tossed around," as Quindlen also once wrote.

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Inside Minds of Columbine Killers

Two books get into the twisted minds of the Columbine killers By Jocelyn McClurg, USA TODAY

What was it about Columbine? Of all the school shootings over the past two decades, it's the one that festers, an ugly wound that won't heal. Now two journalists try to understand the incomprehensible as the 10th anniversary of Columbine nears.

On April 20, 1999, Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, entered their high school in Littleton, Colo., and shot and killed 12 students and one teacher. They didn't come away with the highest body count, even though they had hoped to blow up the school with bombs that never went off. Seung-Hui Cho holds that sad distinction with 32 victims at Virginia Tech.

But there was something so gruesome about what Eric and Dylan did — taunting the helpless students they shot in the school library before killing themselves — that the memory of that horrific day is hard to shake. Dave Cullen's Columbine is the more ambitious and ultimately compelling take on the tragedy. He tries hard to get inside the heads of Eric and Dylan, writing in teen-speak that allows us to inhabit their twisted points of view.

Cullen succeeds in making us "get" Eric. He was a rage-filled psychopath who hated the world. "Eric killed for two reasons: to demonstrate his superiority and to enjoy it," Cullen writes. "For Eric, Columbine was a performance. Homicidal art."

Dylan is a tougher nut to crack. Depressed, suicidal, a misfit convinced he'll never find love, he latches on to Eric in a kind of desperate ennui. Cullen nearly makes us sympathize with Dylan. But Jeff Kass, a reporter for the now-defunct Rocky Mountain News, casts a harsher light on Dylan. He opens his straightforward Columbine: A True Crime Story with a chilling account of what happened in the library. You can't read it and feel anything but revulsion for Dylan. Kass' book also benefits from extensive excerpts and drawings from journals both boys kept.

More insightful psychological profiles of Eric and Dylan can be found in the newly published Why Kids Kill: Inside the Minds of School Shooters by Peter Langman (Palgrave Macmillan, $24.95). Langman makes a strong case that Dylan was also a psychopath.

Cullen, unlike Langman, isn't a psychologist, and he never sufficiently answers the "why" question. (Can anyone?) But he breaks new ground (he claims Eric was not a virgin, for example), dispels myths (that Eric and Dylan were bullied, that they targeted specific kids, that they were members of the "Trench Coat Mafia"), and makes us feel intensely for those who were killed and wounded. His account of what happened to teacher Dave Sanders, who bled to death over many hours, is heartbreaking. So is his unraveling of the sad story of Cassie Bernall, wrongly heralded as a Christian martyr. It was another girl who told the killers she believed in God.

Could Columbine have been prevented? Both books reveal unfortunate lapses and intentional cover-ups by the authorities and cluelessness on the part of the boys' parents. But Eric Harris, coldly intelligent, was a consummate con artist. He hooked up with a lost soul who became his willing partner in a deadly, and unfathomable, folie à deux.

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Using Twitter for Marketing

Marketers find Twitter a tweet recipe for success By Jefferson Graham, USA TODAY LOS ANGELES — Cake decorator Suzi Finer fills in spare time during the workday updating her "status" on Facebook, telling about 2,000 customers about what she's working on. It's no frivolous exercise: Finer is looking to boost business for her employer, Hansen's Cakes of Beverly Hills, and says that sales are up 15% to 20% since she embraced Facebook as a sales tool in September. "That's even in a recession," she says. "People are still having birthday parties and weddings, and seeing these little bits about cakes on updates get them excited about the possibilities." TELL US: How often do you post updates to Twitter, Facebook, or other social networking sites? Welcome to the social world of Facebook and Twitter, where you are encouraged to tell your online "friends" and "followers" about every little thing you're doing Most teens and young adults use the short space to discuss the latest movie, CD or TV show. Business people — including folks like Finer — find that the updates also work as a valuable sales tool. "It's become even more important than blogging," says Chris Winfield, who runs New York-based 10e20, which helps businesses with their online marketing campaigns. "It's more immediate than a blog post, and if you're trying to get out a message to thousands of people in a flash, status updates are the way to do it." Just ask Aaron Chronister, who saw his status update on Twitter grab media attention from CNN and The New York Times, and even a book deal with Simon & Schuster. Chronister of Kansas City, Mo., wanted to get attention for his local barbecue club and a unique bacon recipe. His status post in December got "re-tweeted" by someone else (the Twitter equivalent of forwarding), the media found it, and now he has a thriving ad-supported BBQ blog in addition to a forthcoming book. It all started with a status update, which he renews about four times daily to his 1,500 followers. "It's an easier way for people to see what's up with you," he says. "They don't have to read an e-mail, or go through all this stuff to filter through. Just a short little 140-character message." According to measurement firm Quantcast, Facebook averages 78 million visitors monthly, compared with Twitter's 6 million. However, traffic numbers on Twitter are hard to come by, as much of its traffic is on mobile phones. From his office in Rochester, N.Y., Jeffrey Hayzlett, Kodak's chief marketing officer, updates his status on both Facebook and Twitter as many times as possible during a busy day. He's become the face of Kodak for many Twitterers and Facebookers, as he attempts to give them "a glimpse into my life, which puts a face to the Kodak brand." Like Hayzlett, Finer is the face of Hansen's. She offers free cake samples to anyone on Facebook, posts celebrity-sighting snapshots and talks about the latest cake she's working on, or just the scent of butter cream. "I spend about an hour daily on this, in between cakes," Finer says. Her advice for entrepreneurs looking to boost business: "Don't bother people with sales (pitches) — like 'Come in and see what we have today.' That is so annoying. I don't want a commercial. I'm here to spread the cake love. Write about what makes you happy." Winfield's business used to consist of helping businesses get better placement on search engines, primarily by working on their blogs and improving their websites. Now, his staff spends a good deal of their time helping businesses update their statuses. "It's all about Internet marketing," he says. "If you can catch someone's attention on Twitter, and they go write a blog post about you, someone else might link to it, and that will help your Google rankings." Matt Rutledge, CEO of Dallas-based website Woot, sends out only one Twitter tweet a day — and it's the only marketing he does. Woot sells just one item a day and announces what it is nightly via a Tweet and an RSS feed to his website. Rutledge now has 270,000 Twitter followers — No. 18 overall on Twitterholic's rankings, and No. 1 business. Whole Foods Market and Zappos.com are close behind with 263,000 and 262,000, respectively. He can't point to any measurable sales gains from his Twitter love but says, "It's been enjoyable to watch Twitter grow. For us, with just one product per day, it's really well aligned with a short, micro-summary." Jason Hirschhorn, who recently resigned his post as president of Sling Media, the online programming arm for Sling, is happily unemployed but eager to broadcast his latest missives on both Facebook and Twitter from two to 10 times daily. "It's whatever's on my mind," he says. "I love the idea of telling people what I'm thinking about without having to talk to them," he says. On the plus side, he says he reads their posts as well. "I'm able to ingest a lot more than if I was having conversations with them," he says. "I wonder less about what to read or watch, because they post it, and I value their opinions." (read more)

Effective Communication Suggestions

Ten tips for Effective Communication The ability to be able to communicate well is essential in all walks of life if we are to succeed and accomplish the goals we set out for ourselves. The key to any successful relationship is having the ability to communicate and this applies equally to personal relationships as well as building interpersonal relationships within the workplace. Here are ten tips for developing good communication skills that you can use to build upon. 1. Always let the person who is talking finish what they are saying before you speak, if you speak before they have had their say then you could miss a valuable point, if you break into their conversation it also shows that you think what you have to say matters more than what they do and is extremely bad manners. 2. Listen intently to what the other person is saying to you, if all you are doing is thinking of how you are going to reply to the person then your full attention isn't focused on what they are saying and you could miss something important. 3. Always stay focused on the present and never bring up past issues, however related it may seem. This only cloud the present issues and can make the conversation difficult and even more confusing. 4. Really listen to what the other is saying to you, it is so easy to drift away with thoughts of your own especially if you don't agree with what the person is saying to you, try not to get defensive and don't interrupt them before they have made their point. 5. Instead of trying to win an argument or conflict try to reason and find a solution that is agreeable to both parties, this is a much more effective way to communicate than trying to battle it out just for the sake of winning, this way no one is the loser. 6.Take a break if you cannot come to a reasonable agreement in a conversation when at odds, taking a break will allow you to cool down and gather your thoughts before communicating again. 7. Try to see the other's point of view and don't just stick with what you have in mind, talk over the ins and outs and explain simply and fully why you don't think their idea is a good one while making suggestions of your own, but don,t be too quick to dismiss the others idea until you have the full picture. 8. Even if you don't like what other person is saying try to be respectful of their opinion and do listen to what they have to say even if you don't necessarily agree with them. 9. Don't blow things out of proportion while conversing, if possible avoid starting sentences with "you always"or "you never", always think about what you are saying and make sure that what you are saying is true, blowing things out of proportion, blaming and bringing up the past only creates more negativity. 10.Don't always put all the blame on the other, sometimes we handle conflicts by blaming things entirely on the other and criticizing, try to analyze the situation objectively to find a solution. From: Charles Beaumont Meringandan West, Qld, Australia Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Sensitivity Friends or Fellow Marketers

Reflections from Daegan Smith

Are you being to touchy feely?

This is a condition I personally suffer from. No more glaring a symptom than getting instant messaged at 9pm on a Saturday about silly stuff. If you're being too touchy feely in your business it's not totally your fault. Here's why.

In network marketing we're all taught to be available 24 seven. We say things like: "If you need to do a three way, don't even think if I'm available, just call I'll be there for you." "If you need anything you've got my number just call me."

Nothing wrong with being totally available if that's the type of life you want to create, but take it from it's NOT really the best way to go about things. Why?

You end up becoming an enabler of weakness and not a creator of leadership. If you're always there for any and every little thing for your team and prospects you're setting the wrong expectation from the outset. (It's like spoiling a child.)

I say this not because I'm bigger and better, but because I've got this hang up too. When you let people get access to you and your time all the time you loose the life you're trying to create and breed weakness into your team.

There are some things they should be able to figure out themselves after you've trained them and if you insist on being there for every little thing they never get a chance to grow and be independent.

Leaders are what makes this business go around. You foster that by setting the right expectations, sticking to your guns, and providing what you say you will. You're a coach, not a counselor.

Make sure you define that roll to you first and them second and you'll begin to attract leaders to you. Just a couple days ago I was talking to a friend about this. He started a venture and he made part of the service he rendered complete and open access to him and I quickly adviced him to stop.

When you do this people stop valuing your time. They abuse it. They make things that shouldn't be personal personal. And you grey the line between your role as a

.

Let your friends be your friends and your business partners be your business partners and you'll thrive, have more time, be more respected, and create the life this business is really about.

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Baby Boomers Like Social Networking

New Document

Boomers zero in on social networks

By Marco R. della Cava, USA TODAY

Kirk from Los Angeles would appear to be just another typical MySpace denizen. His page reveals that he's a Sagittarius, loves movies and wants to meet Angelina Jolie. Get in line, kid. Or maybe not.

"I suppose I could just call her dad (actor Jon Voight) and set that up," says Kirk Douglas, who faithfully updates his page once a week. "As long as my wife says it's OK." At 92, the screen icon is at the older end of the growing phenomenon that is social networking. But his decision to share pointed opinions and Brangelina-inspired desires with virtual strangers is echoed by the millions of Boomer-on-up Americans that have taken a teen staple and made it yet another weapon in their always-on communications arsenal.

SURVEY: What different generations do online

Whether it's congressmen Twittering during presidential speeches, parents connecting with high school flames on Facebook or empty-nesters planning group outings on grown-up sites such as Eons.com, Baby Boomers are speeding up the Web's ongoing metamorphosis from limitless void to global watering hole.

Social networking is fast becoming a staple for a growing number of adults as Web use surges. One-third of adult Internet users have a profile on a social networking site, up from 8% in 2005, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project. And though adults share some teen habits — checking in with friends, planning get-togethers — they differ from the younger set in their desire to use the medium to meet new friends from across the country.

Their reasons for connecting with others online vary, but the passion for it is unwavering. For Douglas, social networking affords him a literal voice — a stroke in 1996 left him with halting speech — as well as "instantaneous contact with people of all ages and opinions, which keeps me young."

Retired software consultant Reed Nash, 52, of Lunenburg, Mass., says sharing his passion for NASCAR and barbecue with fellow devotees has "made me a lot of great new friends I otherwise wouldn't have." Kathy Carr, 45, a family counselor from Park City, Utah, used to get her social fix while traveling for work. She has turned to social networking "to find other women who are raising teens, enjoying good careers and have something to say."

Facebook, that social networking giant with 175 million users worldwide, was famously conceived for kids by a kid, Harvard undergrad student Mark Zuckerberg, now 24. But what Boomers like, they devour. "The last six months have been a turning point in terms of people going from not seeing a reason for social networking to fully embracing it," says Lance Ulanoff, editor of PCMag.com. "The reason is simple: We're able to get more real-time information about people we know and love. Social interaction as we know it is changing on the fly." And — OMG! — it's not just shifting for the acronym-speak set.

Networking by the numbers

Currently, 16.5 million adults ages 55 and older engage in social networking, according to Internet monitoring site comScore. Facebook is seeing the most growth among users age 30 and older. MySpace, with 130 million users, is enjoying a surge among the 55-plus set, who total 6.9 million users and spend an average 204 minutes a month on the site. And in just one year since AARP.org unveiled its social networking platform, about 350,000 users have created 1,700 groups celebrating everything from gardening to social activism.

"Our members comfortably exist in both the real and virtual worlds," says Nataki Clarke, director of online marketing at AARP. "Social networking may have started out as a way to check on kids and grandkids, but it's now really all about your individual connections with peers."

The desire to get in touch with like-minded souls is fueling the growth of sites such as Eons.com and TBD.com (as in, the rest of your life is still "to be determined"), which attract those who don't want to be "friended" by someone whose idea of a good conversation means a tweeted 140 characters or less.

"The Facebooks of the world are about all about 'me' — my page, my profile, my wall. We're about 'we,' about getting together in groups around mutual passions," says Jeff Taylor, founder of Eons, which has 800,000 users who bond over topics such as genealogy, elder care and technology.

One hallmark of sites such as Eons is their mission to lure new friends who share your interests, a direct contrast with a site such as Facebook, where you attract largely those you knew or know. "My teenage daughter is online all the time," Taylor says. "But when I asked her about wanting to meet new friends, she said, 'Dad, that's disgusting.' There's the big difference."

Boomers, by contrast, often embrace the notion of making new friends online, says Robin Wolaner, CEO of TBD.com, whose 120,000-user membership has been growing by 20% a month. "By the time you're 50, you tend to know everyone you're going to know. So if you're going online, why not meet new people as opposed to the same people you already know?" she says. "We're finding that these bad economic times are particularly good for social networking.

"Boomers are really affected by what's going on, and they like not to be alone with their thoughts." So much so that some social networkers feel compelled to take their new friendships offline. A group of Eons.com friends recently went on a cruise to Alaska together, and around 50 TBD.com acquaintances are meeting in Kansas City later this month to share thoughts on spirituality.

Some Internet experts are particularly convinced that the future of social networking lies less in the realm of vacuous instant updates to friends ("I'm drinking a latte right now while online at an ATM") and more in the arena of like-minded groups gathering virtually to enjoy and comment on a specific event.

"I call these 'velvet-rope social networks,' people who are connected in a context that matters to them all, like watching the Oscars together online," says Chris Brogan, president of Boston-based New Marketing Labs, which advises large corporations on how to market using social networking. "It's going back to the idea of hitting the bar or pub to talk about something, a gathering place to share group moments. In a world where few people live close to family or old friends, the Internet can bridge that gap."

Such gatherings could have implications that ripple through society, affecting everything from TV viewing habits to the way companies peddle products. The old model "of an Ed McMahon-type guy pitching you something is long dead, because today people won't listen to TV ads, but they will listen to each other on these sites," says Barton Goldenberg, president of Bethesda, Md.-based ISM, a social media consultancy. "It's all being reversed now. Ads won't drive brand loyalty, people will. These sites are where Boomers share their opinions, and those in the corporate world are starting to realize that."

Time magazine tech columnist Josh Quittner says social networking is destined to mushroom with the inevitable advent of more sophisticated smart phones, which will allow sites such as Facebook, MySpace and Eons to be always on and mobile. "The great thing about social networking is it allowed you to take control of your identity online, so now you are who you say you are," says Quittner, 50.

But for all its potential power, social networking remains in its awkward infancy, offering up equal parts excitement (hearing from that grade school sweetheart) and weirdness (what to do when your boss friends you?). Quittner concedes he runs hot and cold on the notion of living a life exposed to the digital masses. "Visiting some friends' pages you often see things that are shocking. I guess it's like a tattoo: a good idea at the time."

For some users, it's the "social" part that's at issue. Dee Dee Taft, 41, who runs Spin Communications in Mill Valley, Calif., joined Facebook a few years back at the encouragement of younger members of her firm. "When I started, it was exciting, but then I was getting friended by people I met once and people that I had purely business relationships with, and it made me wonder, 'What's the definition of a friend?'"

On the upside, she has reconnected with a few long-lost friends. The down side? Having CEO clients friending some of her twentysomething staffers, and getting messages from family members that hundreds of her Facebook friends can read. "It's almost voyeuristic. Everyone can see you and you can see them," she says. "Sometimes, I feel like yelling, 'Just pick up the phone and call me!'"

But for the Rev. Rosa Lee Harden of San Francisco's Holy Innocents' Episcopal Church, such liabilities are worth the benefits of opening your life up to others online. Harden often Twitters to get ideas for a sermon and says her Facebook page has at times provoked "startlingly honest conversations" that might never happen face to face.

Recently, Roman Catholic bishops in Italy asked their flock to give up e-mail and other tech habits for Lent. For Harden, that whole notion is like trying to stop a rocket that has already launched. "I want to connect with the people I work with and love," she says. "If social networking makes it easier, or more likely, then I'll take it any day." http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Work Life Balance and Gender

Gender roles see a 'conflict' shift in work-life balance

By Sharon Jayson, USA TODAY

Women in two-earner couples are contributing more to family income, but it's the men who are feeling more conflicted over the work-life balance, according to a survey of 3,500 workers released today. Asked how much jobs and family life interfere with each other, 59% of fathers in dual-income families reported conflict in 2008, while just 35% did in 1977. For mothers, reported conflict increased from 40% to 45%.

Findings from the telephone survey for the nonprofit Families and Work Institute suggest what some experts say is a "tipping point" in attitudes about gender roles, work and family. "It does signal more equality of expectations — that men are no longer let off the hook," says Scott Coltrane, a sociologist at the University of Oregon.

Up until the past decade, "men weren't doing enough to add stress to their lives," he says. Since then, men have been spending more time with their children and more time caretaking, which the survey finds has elevated the inner strife.

"What we see here is that the conflict for women hasn't increased as fast because it was already so high," says sociologist Kathleen Gerson of New York University. Other findings show: •Annual income contributed by women in dual-income couples rose to 44% in 2008; 26% of such women earned at least 10% more than their partners.

Traditional gender roles have lost favor among both sexes. About 60% of men and women say they disagree with the idea that men should earn the money and women should take care of the children. Women under age 29 are just as likely as men to want greater work responsibility, regardless of whether they have children.

"When you get men and women feeling the same, maybe it is a sea change," says Ellen Galinsky, the institute's president. Sociologist Brian Powell of Indiana University, however, says even though "there probably has been real change, I have the sense there's been more of a change in terms of people's view that there should be equal division. That's probably farther ahead of the actual behavior."

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

New Fico Rules Affect Credit Score

New Credit Score Formula Could Increase Your Score

(ARA) - The FICO credit score formula that is used by lenders to determine your "credit worthiness" will soon be changing. The higher your FICO score, the more likely you are to get a better deal on a mortgage, auto loan and even a cell phone contract. But with the new changes, your credit score could change significantly.

air Isaac, the company that pioneered the FICO score, says the new scoring system will be more accurate than the original system, but until the system is in place it's difficult to tell if the impact on your credit score will be negative or positive.

Some of the proposed changes to the FICO scoring system include:

Stronger penalties for late payments. Better rewards for prompt payment. Different types of debt will be scored differently

With credit becoming increasingly difficult to secure, it's more important than ever that you know all the facts surrounding your credit report. FICO credit scores are approximately determined by the following criteria:

Payment history -- 35 percent Types of credit used -- 30 percent Amounts owed -- 15 percent Length of credit history -- 10 percent New credit -- 10 percent

Don't let the changes to the FICO scoring system lower your score. Check your updated credit score for free today at GoFreeCredit.com, a Better Business Bureau accredited service. Checking your own credit does not hurt your score.

Copyright ©, ARAnet, Inc. Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Shut off PCs at Night Save Energy

Leaving PCs on overnight costs companies $2.8B a year

By Jon Swartz, USA TODAY

SAN FRANCISCO — Even during an economic meltdown, when companies are scrambling to cut costs, businesses are wasting billions of dollars by leaving their PCs on at night. U.S. organizations squander $2.8 billion a year to power unused machines, emitting about 20 million tons of carbon dioxide — roughly the equivalent of 4 million cars — according to a report to be released Wednesday.

About half of 108 million office PCs in the USA are not properly shut down at night, says the 2009 PC Energy Report, produced by 1E, an energy-management software company, and the non-profit Alliance to Save Energy. The report analyzed workplace PC power consumption in the USA, United Kingdom and Germany.

Wastefulness does not just affect a company's bottom line, it creates environmental concerns, the report says. If the world's 1 billion PCs were powered down just one night, it would save enough energy to light the Empire State Building — inside and out — for over 30 years, it says.

"Workers do not feel responsible for electricity bills at work, and some companies insist PCs remain on at night so they can be patched with software updates," says 1E CEO Sumir Karayi. He says 63% of employees surveyed said their companies should take more steps to save PC power.

"It is scary how much energy is wasted," says Michael Murphy, senior manager of global environmental affairs at Dell, a business partner and customer of 1E. It has used 1E software to efficiently manage its 50,000 PCs globally, saving about $1.8 million a year.

Simply shutting down PCs at night can save a company with 10,000 PCs over $260,000 a year and 1,871 tons of carbon dioxide emissions, the report says. "PCs can be a tremendous drain on electricity," says Doug Washburn, an analyst at Forrester Research. "During a nine-hour workday, it isn't always in use because of lunch, meetings and other things."

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Play Relieves Stress in Bad Times

Experts say play time can relieve stress in bad times By Janice Lloyd, USA TODAY

Stuart Brown appears to be lighthearted and hooked on playing. He made his office in a treehouse in Carmel Valley, Calif. He is tan and fit. The 76-year-old psychiatrist plays tennis with his buddies every week and recently took a cross-country ski vacation with his adult sons and older brother in the Sierra Nevada mountains.

But his message could not be any more serious, especially during these difficult economic times. Find regular time to play — or else, he warns in his new book Play: How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination and Invigorates the Soul (Penguin, $24.95). Or else what?

A life of rigidity, lacking in creativity. A life without joy, minus sustained pleasure. The opposite of play isn't work, he adds, but depression. During his 40-year career, Brown has peered into the bubbling inferno, studying what goes wrong when people do not play. He has conducted more than 6,000 play studies on everyone from serial killers to substance abusers to career-driven CEOs.

And he is worried many adults are not finding time to play now as the economy forces them to work harder in offices with smaller staffs, then head home to help with chores and rest before starting it all over again. He writes that when we are in peril, "the drive to play will disappear." These are perilous times.

"Play is particularly important during periods that are sustainedly stressful, like now where we don't see an end to this economic downturn," says Brown, founder of the National Institute of Play in Carmel. The non-profit institute compiles research on play and provides speakers to discuss the importance of play with educational organizations and Fortune 500 companies.

"If we're going to adapt to changing economic and personal circumstances the way that nature armed us to do, then we have to find ourselves having some play time virtually every day," Brown says. So for the play-challenged, Brown has advice on how to get back into the swing (maybe even the backyard swing).

Experiment, Brown says. Go back to thinking about how you played as a child. He writes about a woman who basically had a "turbocharged" day taking care of her family and her job as the CEO of a real estate company. Up at 5 a.m., she ran 4 or 5 miles on odd days and swam and lifted weights on even days.

She started to dread life. She set out to find a solution and remembered some of her fondest memories as a child involved horses. Now, she rides one day a week and is happier and more productive.

A state of mind

Matthew Calabria of Washington, D.C., has always loved playing hoops. He got tired of working out at the gym and paying his gym fees but did not want to go without exercise. It helps him blow off steam after days spent working at the State Department. He posted an item on Craigslist in February looking for people to play pickup games.

"We're playing on a small court outside with 10-foot rims, but it suffices," he says. "It's really a kids' court, but we're just doing it for fun. I played in high school and missed it." Brown lives near Pebble Beach and says he has played a few rounds of golf there. For most people, he says, it's "the highlight of a life, a special moment to play" on the famed course. But for others? "I've seen golfers who are ticked off when they tee off and are no different after 18 holes."

That's not play, he says. Nor is it play when a runner has high fitness goals or strives for fast times. That adds too much stress. Running for the pure joy of it or running with a friend and socializing is fun and relaxing.

There are all kinds of play; what's important is to find out what kind of play is right for you. Some are as simple as really playing with and enjoying the dog when you are walking it, rather than begrudgingly taking it outside. Play is not being cutthroat or winning at all costs. That's about domination, he says. And play can and ought to be involved at work.

A big part of the solution, he says, is opening up to the idea that play is a state of mind. Every day, there are opportunities to play, which he defines as "an absorbing, apparently purposeless activity that provides enjoyment and a suspension of self-consciousness and sense of time."

But society pushes adults away from play, teaching them to think playful activities are for children, a frivolous luxury and immoral. Plus, Brown says, the economy has made it hard for adults to think they deserve to have fun or can afford fun. Mental health professionals say that kind of thinking is a serious red flag — and they're seeing more of it.

"People say, 'I can't have fun when my 401(k) is down or I lost my job,' " says Nadine Kaslow, family psychologist and professor at Emory University in Atlanta. "What I say to people is you're probably not going to have as much pleasure as you did when things were better, but play is something that can make us feel better about ourselves and more engaged with other people."

One of play's benefits, says Penny Donnefeld, a clinical psychologist in Manhattan, is it reduces stress hormones in the bloodstream. Because continuously high stress levels wreak havoc on our bodies, she says, the health benefits alone should give adults motivation to play. "If this is going to keep your arteries clear and keep you alive longer, maybe it's worth considering," Donnefeld says.

Not sure which kinds of recreation are right for you? Michael Otto has a tip. No watch, no cellphone. "All of us end up being better at tracking what is going poorly than what goes well," says Otto, director of the Center for Anxiety and Related Disorders at Boston University. "One intervention is to ask people to keep a diary of moments of well-being. If you do that, you end up with a diary and collection of moments that helps you feel good, and it's a diary about what to pursue next week."

Ken Silverstein, 49, knows what works for him. The anesthesiologist lives in Wilmington, Del., and goes on a mountain biking trek every year with Escape Adventures. This will be his 10th year. "It's the last thing I'd give up if I had to save money," Silverstein says. "It's like oxygen, it's so important to me. There's nothing more liberating in the world than being on the bike. We take no cellphones, and you have to leave your watch behind." Silverstein says he also takes time during the week to ride "almost no matter what. I'm very busy, work very hard and cycling is my outlet."

Sex is a refuge, too. Brown says it is no coincidence that people who stay sharp as they age are those who keep working and playing. And couples who stay together also play together, he says, especially when they have different play personalities that might lead them in different directions.

"I encourage couples to have a weekly date," Kaslow says. "They put something on a piece of paper that would be fun for them to do into a love jar and take turns pulling it out of there and doing whatever it is." Sex counts big time in the world of play, Brown says, when partners try to draw each other out, they are in effect freeing themselves and relaxing.

ROMANCE: Nearly 80% says economy hasn't slowed frequency of sex

"Lovers can be so involved they shut out the rest of the world," Brown says. "For them, there is nothing but each other, the essential dyad."

Above all else, Brown says, remember play is not perfect. It has its trying moments, too. To sail, you need to take care of the boat. To ride your bike, you need to strengthen muscles.Toward the end of his book, he mentions a bike ride along a steep winding road lined with redwoods and laurel near his home. He calls the ride up Robinson Canyon "play bliss."

"The uphill slog is slow, physically demanding, and my aching thighs and lungs beg for relief. "The road opens to a panorama of ocean and woodlands. The light is different on every ride, the push worth it, and on the glide home my spirit is clear, happy, at one with body, nature, spirit."

(read more)

Powers of a Positive Attitude

The Powers of a Positive Attitude

To members of The Ultimate MLM Formula for your online empire! Preston Tutein

I am going to ask you to something very weird right now. First of all, I want you to listen to your thoughts. Now tell me, what thoughts fill your head? Would you label them as positive, or negative?

Now let's say you are walking down the street with these thoughts. Do you think anyone who would meet you would be able to tell you what’s on your mind?

The answer to number one is up to you. But, the answer number two can be pretty generic. Although people will not be able to tell you exactly what you think, they will more or less have an idea of how you are feeling.

Here's another question. When you enter a party filled with friends, do they all fall silent as if something terrible had happened? Or does everybody there perk up as if waiting for something exciting to happen?

You know what? The answer to all these depends on your frame of mind.

Thoughts are very powerful. They affect your general attitude. The attitude you carry reflects on your appearance, too – unless, of course, you are a great actor.

And it doesn't end there. Your attitude can also affect people around you.

The type of attitude you carry depends on you. It can be either positive or negative.

Positive thoughts have a filling effect. They are admittedly invigorating. Plus, the people around the person carrying positive thoughts are usually energized by this type of attitude.

Negative thoughts on the other hand have a sapping effect on other people. Aside from making you look gloomy and sad, negative thoughts can turn a festive gathering into a funeral wake.

A positive attitude attracts people, while a negative attitude repels them. People tend to shy away from those who carry a negative attitude.

We can also define attitude as the way of looking at the world. If you choose to focus on the negative things in the world, more or less you have a negative attitude brewing up. However, if you choose to focus on the positive things, you are more likely to carry a positive attitude.

You have much to gain from a very positive attitude. For one, studies have shown that a positive attitude promotes better health. Those with this kind of attitude also have more friends. projecting a positive attitude also helps one to handle stress and problems better than those who have a negative attitude.

A positive attitude begins with a healthy self-image. If you will love the way you are and are satisfied, confident, and self-assured, you also make others that are around feel the same way.

A negative attitude, on the other hand, has, of course, an opposite effect. So, carrying a negative attitude has a twofold drawback. You feel bad about yourself, and you make others feel the same way.

If you want to have a positive attitude, you have to feature healthy thoughts. This is probably very hard to do nowadays since, all around us, the media feeds us nothing but negative thoughts. This is truly a saddening thought.

If you want a healthier outlook in life, you need to think happy thoughts, and you have to hear positive things as well. So, what can you do? Well, for starters, you could see a funny movie, you could play with children, spend some time telling jokes with friends. All these activities fill you with positive stimuli, which in turn promotes positive attitude.

Although it is impossible to keep ourselves from the negative things around us, you can still carry a positive attitude by focusing on the good things, the positive things in life.

And this positive attitude you now carry can be of benefit to other people. Sometimes when other people feel down, the thing people mostly do is try to give them advice. But sometimes, all they need is somebody to sit by them, and listen to them. If you have a positive attitude you may be able to cheer them up without even having to say anything.

If positive attitude is really great, why do people choose to adopt a negative attitude instead? One who carries a negative attitude may be actually sending a signal for attention. Before you get me wrong, feeling sad, angry, or gloomy is not wrong itself. But dwelling on these thoughts for far too long is not healthy either. There is a time to mourn.

As always, if you are beset by troubles, even in your darkest hour, focus on the good things in life, you will always have hope. Problems become something you can overcome.

You do not have much to lose by adopting a healthy, positive attitude. Studies show that such an attitude actually retards aging, makes you healthier, helps you develop a better stress coping mechanism, and has a very positive effect on all the people you meet every day. So, what's not to like about a positive attitude? Adopt one today.

To Your Success,Preston Tutein http://ULTIMATE.TUTEIN.INFO Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Americans Fear Great Depression

CNN poll reveals a growing number of Americans fear the recession could turn into another Great Depression.

By Paul Steinhauser, CNN Last Updated: March 17, 2009: 7:42 AM ET

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The number of Americans who think another Great Depression will occur within the next year is on the rise, a poll released Tuesday shows. Forty-five percent of people questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey said another depression is likely.

"Will the Great Recession turn into another Great Depression? A growing number of Americans think it might," said CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "Last December, 38% said a depression like the one the U.S. experienced in the 1930s was likely in the next year. Now that number is up 7 points."

But Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke doesn't share that sentiment. Asked during an interview with CBS on Sunday whether the country is headed into a new depression, Bernanke said, "I think we've averted that risk. I think we've gotten past that."

The poll described the 1930s' Great Depression as a time in which roughly one out of four workers was unemployed, banks failed across the country and millions of ordinary Americans were temporarily homeless or unable to feed their families.

Nearly nine out of ten people questioned in the survey said economic conditions in the country are poor today, with only 11% suggesting that conditions are good. And the poll indicates that Americans think it will take time to rebound from the recession, which began at the end of 2007.

"Only one in ten say recovery is likely within a year; one in five predict it will take longer than four years for the country to get back on its feet," Holland said.

The CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll was conducted Thursday through Sunday, with 1,019 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The survey's sampling error is plus or minus 3 percentage points.

(read more)

Economy|college|retirement|confidence|mortgage|debt

New Document

Americans fear losing their quality of life

Study: Owners' confidence in ability to pay mortgages drops 8 percentage points Americans doubting their ability to pay off debt, including credit cards and car loans

Poll: Thirty-nine percent confident in ability to maintain standard of living in next year By Paul Steinhauser CNN

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Americans are losing confidence in their ability to keep their current standard of living, a new national poll indicates.

Thirty-nine percent of people questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. survey released Thursday morning said they're very confident they'll be able to maintain their standard of living over the next year. That's down 6 percentage points from last year.

Half of all homeowners with a mortgage said they are very confident that they can continue to meet their mortgage payments, but that number is also down, by 8 percentage points, since last year. Americans' confidence in their ability to pay other debts, such as credit cards and car loans, also has dropped in the past year.

And there is much less confidence in being able to save for specific goals. One in four parents of children younger than 18 said they are very confident in their ability to pay for college. And one in five Americans who have not already retired said they are very confident in their ability to save enough to retire comfortably.

"As the nation's economy has gotten worse, Americans' confidence in their own economic prospects has slipped, and it is lowest when it comes to long-term goals such as saving for college or retirement," said Keating Holland, CNN polling director.

"The public is fairly confident on personal matters such as paying off mortgages or other debts and on maintaining their standard of living, but the last year has seen a worrisome erosion of confidence."

The CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll was conducted March 12 through Sunday, with 1,019 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The survey's sampling error is plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Submitted by James McLellan

http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/foxes-report/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Mental Stress|Economy|Increase

Mental stress spirals with economy

By Marilyn Elias, USA TODAY

As the economic crisis gathered steam last year, Americans became increasingly stressed out and experienced worsened mental health — a trend that continues today, according to a landmark Gallup-Healthways poll out this week.

Done nearly every day in 2008 and still ongoing, the survey of 355,334 people is believed to be the largest, longest and most thorough poll showing how emotional well-being shifts with economic changes. The survey produces a so-called Emotional Health Index (EHI) — a measure that weighs negatives such as depression, worry and stress against the positive feelings a person experienced the day before the survey.

HARD TIMES: What's your 'emotional type'?

Among highlights of the poll:

Stress shot up over 2008, peaking in the fall and winter as the economic crisis deepened, then continuing high through February. The 10 least happy days of 2008 all were in the last quarter. Emotional well-being overall dropped, too, driven largely by declines in mental health for the poorest people.

Americans' moods were ultra-sensitive to economic news. Well-being plunged on days when the Dow lost big and with reports of high jobless claims. A state's EHI correlated with high rates of death from ailments such as heart disease, says Gallupanalyst Raksha Arora.

States with a lot of open space or sunshine — Hawaii, Alaska, Wyoming — had some of the best emotional health even as the economy sank. Many poorer and Rust Belt states — West Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky — were worst off.

There were few racial differences, but Hispanics, the nation's largest and fastest growing minority, had the worst emotional health all year long. The poll was a joint effort between Gallup and Healthways, a disease-management company.

POLL: 21% scrambling to pay medical bills

INTERACTIVE GRAPHIC: See who's most affected nationwide The poll findings are no surprise to anyone on the front lines of mental health care, says David Baron, chairman of the psychiatry department at Temple University School of Medicine in Philadelphia. "This recession has touched people in virtually every walk of life," Baron says.

SLEEPLESS: Economy keeping many up at night

The link between the EHI and illness makes sense, adds Stevan Hobfoll, a psychologist at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. Depression increases smoking and drinking and discourages exercise; it also raises the risk of heart disease, he says.

The survey shows that those 30 to 55 years old, prime earning years, may be suffering most from the bad economic news, says Gallup's Arora. And these are also prime-time decades for raising families. But that's getting harder in such a tough economic climate, says Julie Moghal, a psychologist based at CHOC Children's Hospital in Orange, Calif. "So many parents are feeling guilty and upset about how to handle economic reverses with their children," she says.

Hispanics take it hard.

The particularly poor emotional health of Hispanics may be caused by cultural qualities as well as their economic roles, according to experts. Although women overall have higher depression rates than men, Hispanic women have the highest rates of all women, says Caroline Clauss-Ehlers of Rutgers University, a bilingual psychologist who counsels many Hispanic families in New York. Latinos take great pride in caring well for their families, "and if you're the mother, and the family isn't doing well, a lot of the women feel they're to blame," she says.

Hispanic men and women feel shame if they can't take good care of their families — a hard act when the economy is nose-diving. This shame can prompt people to isolate themselves, keeping anguish private so they don't get the support they need, Clauss-Ehlers says.

Many Hispanic adults send money home regularly to even-poorer family members in other countries, she adds, so the recession has amplified pressure. In the USA, a lot of Hispanics work as small-business owners dependent on Hispanic customers, who have lost work in this economic crisis as contractors, construction workers, painters or day laborers, according to Estuardo Rodriguez, spokesman for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fun. With the building market collapsed, Hispanics have taken a hard hit in this recession, he says.

Someone who knows that too well is 35-year-old Raul DeAnda of Antioch, Calif. He had a good job in home construction, owned a house and supported three children with his wife expecting a fourth, when the unexpected slammed down on them in May: The company he worked for went out of business. DeAnda spent nine months searching for work without success as savings dwindled and bills piled up. Now the family is facing foreclosure. Just last week, he latched onto another construction job, but he and his wife both fear it may be temporary and worry that they're so behind in mortgage payments they're going to lose their house, anyway.

He's a nervous wreck. And his wife, Lorena De La Cruz, minces no words on how she feels: "I'm very stressed, anxious, depressed and worried about our family." The longer it has gone on, the more worried she has become, De La Cruz says. With four children 2 months to 7 years old, she can't easily join the work force herself and prays her husband can keep this construction job.

Support system weakens.

Even if lower-income people seek counseling for recession-related stress, they may have to wait a long time or never get help, says a report on public mental-health services out Wednesday that suggests one reason why poorer adults may be sinking in emotional well-being as the economy worsens.

The mental health system that serves them was on the economic chopping block all over the USA last year, with widespread slashes in services, says Michael Fitzpatrick, executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, which put out the report.

Meanwhile, many therapists treating more upscale patients are hearing about more money-related traumas and pleas for reduced rates. As the Gallup-Healthways survey shows, stress has risen across the board. Kathy Seus, 45, of Chicago was upbeat and fairly optimistic after losing her sales job in January. With experience in sales, marketing and management, plus an MBA from the University of Chicago, she hoped a strong effort would help her land another job. Two months later, optimism has waned and depression is setting in. There's no job in sight.

Meanwhile, her property taxes for March have gone unpaid. So has her mortgage, because she tried to negotiate a lower payment and says the bank wouldn't work with her until she stopped paying. "For the first time in my life, I'm really scared and very worried about losing a house in which I've invested every cent I have and have lived in for 13 years," she says.

Many friends have slipped away as she has struggled to keep her head above water, Seus says. "They offer no comfort. I tell people I lost my job and am worried about losing my house, and they tell me how they've had to cut back on manicures." She keenly appreciates those who have shown empathy. "The few that have been there for me have been absolute lifesavers," she says. "I hope that one day I can return the favor."

Supportive friends are vital for people facing economic crisis, says Lanny Berman, executive director of the American Association of Suicidology. A lack of supportive relationships is tied to higher suicide rates among the unemployed, Berman says. Unemployed adults have two to four times the suicide rates of employed people, but coping skills in hard times vary widely, he adds.

Suicides spiked during the Great Depression but didn't increase in later recessions lasting an average of 10 months, according to the suicidology group's website. The current recession is 15 months long and counting.

The Gallup-Healthways poll shows a lot of people are suffering in this scary economic crisis, "and we need to be more concerned about what happens with suicide now," Berman says. When someone is in despair over economic problems, "give them support and see that they get help for mental health problems," he says. "This is the time to be our brother's keeper."

Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/programs.php?jcmcl812 (read more)

Facebook|hype|Fortune|Revenue

Comment: Doing business on the Internet is about making money, getting residual income. Presumably, people who follow you on Facebook or another social network will follow your recommendations on spending their money. Consider finding a team for mentoring so that you think carefully and know how not to waste your time on social networking and protect your children when they go to it. That's just common sense!

Why I hate Facebook

The social networking wunderkind may be cool. But enough already! How's it ever going to make money...especially in a recession?

By Paul R. La Monica, CNNMoney.com editor at large

Last Updated: February 20, 2009: 2:08 PM ET

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- I need to take a break from all the gloom in the markets and economy for an Andy Rooney-esque rant. Indulge me.

I don't know about you. But I'm sick of all the Facebookk hype. For the record, I am not on Facebook, and the recent fuss about privacy doesn't affect me -- I'm not a disgruntled user with an axe to grind.

What I don't get is how Facebook has become such a phenomenon. Our sister publication Fortune even recently published a story about the company called "How Facebook is taking over our lives." It's a great story...even though Facebook hasn't taken over my life.

Don't get me wrong. I realize some people swear by Facebook. I understand its addictive charms. My wife is a recent convert and she loves it.

Also, I am by no means a Luddite. I break out into cold sweats if I haven't checked my BlackBerry for more than 10 minutes. I believe that the invention of the DVR is proof that some supreme deity exists. And I even sometimes use my BlackBerry to program my DVR.

But I honestly don't have the time to commit to Facebook. My job, especially since the implosion of Lehman Brothers in September, keeps me insanely busy. And after sitting at a computer typing all day, the last thing I want to do when I get home is sit in front of another computer so I can upload photos to my Wall and read 25 random things about a high school classmate I haven't spoken to in 18 years.

I also don't feel the need to constantly update an entire network of friends about the daily minutiae of my life. My brother recently harassed me over the phone about why I wasn't on Facebook. My response was, "You want my status update? I'm about to hang up on you."

I may be in the minority. The Facebook universe is now 175 million users strong. But how is this company ever going to generate meaningful revenue and post profits from this massive user base? Popularity's nice, but profits are cooler.

In the Fortune story, there is a chart showing how quickly Facebook got to 150 million users compared to other technologies such as the iPod, cellphone and television.

While it's impressive that it took Facebook only 5 years compared with 7 years for Apple to "sell" 150 million iPods, who has the better business model?

Facebook merely signed up people to use their service...for free. Apple sold a product...and a pretty pricey one at that. What's more, Apple (AAPL, Fortune 500) makes money when people buy music from iTunes for their iPod.

Facebook board member and Netscape founder Marc Andreessen said on an appearance on PBS' "Charlie Rose" show this week that if it wanted to, Facebook could start monetizing its user base immediately by selling more ads.

But how much money would it really make? The site already has some advertising. But are they effective? I argue that Facebook or any social network can never truly be a major generator of ad revenue. Users of Facebook like the site because it allows them to easily connect and communicate with friends. It's the 21st century version of Ma Bell.

By that very token, how happy would you be if you had to listen to an ad when you picked up the phone before you were able to get a dial tone? Even if users tolerate ads on Facebook, I'm not sure they'd actually click on them.

Why Facebook isn't Google

Facebook is a completely different animal than the other Web wunderkind it is often compared to: Google. The beauty of Google (GOOG, Fortune 500) is that, despite all its efforts to diversify, it really is all about searching for information. If I go to Google to find the best airline fares to Buenos Aires, a sponsored search result may actually be helpful as opposed to being obtrusive.

If I go to Facebook to try and top my friends' best score in Scramble, I'm there to freaking play Scramble. Even a "contextually relevant" ad for Boggle is going to irritate me. Yeah, Facebook may be "stickier" than Google. But I'm not hanging around waiting for an ad.

I'm also skeptical about Facebook's plan, unveiled earlier this month, to offer user information to companies so they can target specific users for online polls. For one, it sounds like another privacy backlash waiting to happen...similar to the Beacon service Facebook launched in 2007.

With Beacon, Facebook partnered with online retailers that would track a users' credit card use. So if you bought something online, friends in your network could see that. Problem was that when Facebook set it up, all users were automatically enrolled in Beacon. Not a smart move. After an unsurprising uproar, Facebook changed it so users had to opt-in.

Also, don't most people hate consumer research polls? When is the last time you decided it was a good idea to waste 15 minutes of your life happily chatting with a telemarketer?

To me, Facebook seems to be growing for growth's sake without a plan for making money. And that's really risky in a recession as bad as this one. Not only is Facebook faced with the prospect of ad spending declining this year; it also has to likely deal with the rising costs to manage the increased amount of data as it signs on more and more users. So while I applaud Facebook for its ability to attract a loyal base of users, I just don't get how it will ever be a financial success.

The Fortune story closed by saying that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg doesn't want to sell to Microsoft (MSFT,Fortune 500) because he wants to build the next Microsoft. But Bill Gates didn't become one of the wealthiest men on the planet by giving away operating systems for free now did he?

First Published: February 20, 2009: 12:20 PM ET

Comment: I, personally, am concerned about the gap between "knowing" another person as he/she wants to be presented on line and what it's like to get to know someone face-to-face. Second, I'm concerned about this medium, but even more that of MySpace, being used by sexual predators. Third, social networking is another fad. What happens to any company that doesn't make a profit? Fourth, what about a company that, after a public uproar, says, "You can maintain control of your data for the time being?" Are you sure they won't flip-flop upon the advice of lawyers or number-crunchers? Now, what do you think? Find this article at: http://money.cnn.com/2009/02/20/markets/thebuzz/index.htm?postversion=2009022012 Submitted by James McLellan http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/programs.php?jcmcl812 (read more)

Facebook Taking over our Lives

How Facebook is taking over our lives

President Obama used it to get elected. Dell will recruit new hires with it. Microsoft's new operating system borrows from it. No question, Facebook has friends in high places. Can CEO Mark Zuckerberg make those connections pay off?

By Jessi Hempel, writer

Part Three

The stream

Every user on Facebook has two feeds. There's a personal feed, which you'll find on your profile page along with your photo and list of interests. Every time you log a status update, comment, or video post, that interaction is captured and stored for your review; those changes also become fodder for a second news feed that runs on your home page, the first page you see when you log on to the site.

That feed keeps tabs on all the interactions your friends are having (and alerts friends to updates you've made on your personal feed). If your brother RSVP'd to a dinner party, for example, you might be notified about it, even if you weren't invited to attend. And if you change your profile photo, it may let your brother know. Like Facebook itself, the feeds are subject to the network effect: The more data you share and interact with, the more robust your news feed becomes.

Zuckerberg calls the sum of those interactions the "stream," and it's his newest obsession. Unlike Google, which uses complex algorithms to serve up advertisements based on what you search for, Facebook lets you help "curate" your feeds. The information that pops up is partly a result of controls you establish in your privacy settings and feedback you provide to Facebook. But Facebook also can track your behavior, and if the site notices you're spending a lot of time on the fan page of a certain movie star, for example, it will send you more information about that celebrity.

Needless to say, marketers would love to tap into that information. "If there are 150 million people in a room, you should probably go to that room," says Narinder Singh, chief product officer for Appirio, which helps big companies like Dell and Starbucks (SBUX, Fortune 500) find ways to connect with users over the site. "It's too attractive a set of people and too large a community for businesses to ignore."

Yet because businesses haven't yet effectively infiltrated Facebook, its users may be under the mistaken impression that they aren't under surveillance. "What I like is that it doesn't bombard you with advertisements, so it feels really personal," says Heather Rowley, a 35-year-old photographer in Berkeley. It seems inevitable that some members will feel betrayed or uneasy when ads based on casual chats with friends start to appear on their feeds.

Facebook already has had one brush with member backlash in 2007 when it introduced a feature called Beacon, which allowed members to see what websites their friends visited, and even showed purchases on e-commerce sites. Users protested vehemently - one even filed a lawsuit on privacy grounds - and Facebook apologized.

Now the company is trying a slightly different approach. A feature called Facebook Connect lets users log on to company websites using their Facebook logins. The system, which dovetails with Zuckerberg's vision of a Facebook account as a form of personal ID on the web (privacy settings and all), appeals to advertisers for a couple of reasons. When a user logs on to a third-party site using Facebook Connect, that activity may be reported on her friends' news feeds, which serves as a de facto endorsement. The tool also makes it easy for members to invite their friends to check out the advertiser's site.

Starbucks, for example, uses Facebook Connect on its Pledge5 site, which asks people to donate five hours of time to volunteer work. If you sign in using a Facebook account, a new screen, a hybrid of Facebook and the Pledge5 home page, pops up with information on how to find local volunteer opportunities. A tab on the page asks you to "help spread the word." Click on it and your entire address book of Facebook friends pops up, enabling you to evangelize Pledge5 with just a few keystrokes.

So far most of the organizations using Facebook Connect are social enterprises, like Pledge5, or news outlets, like CNN, soliciting members for discussion groups. Who knows how Facebook users will react when a brokerage asks a member to spread the word about its services. Of course, members can ignore the exhortations to invite friends, the same way they might decline to forward their 25 Random Things.

He also insists that marketing on Facebook isn't obtrusive, and that users can control what kind of advertising they see: Each ad contains a small thumbs-up or thumbs-down button. If a user finds an ad irrelevant, repetitive, or offensive, she clicks thumbs-down, and Facebook records her dissatisfaction.

Eventually the inappropriate ads will go away. And when ads are useful, many online users do click on them. Rowley, the California photographer who values Facebook's intimacy, says she recently clicked on a Virgin America ad for tickets to the East Coast when it popped up on her news feed. "I was going there, so it made sense," she says.

Still, the company couldn't have picked a worse time to start wooing marketers in earnest. Online advertising growth is expected to decelerate in 2009 from 17.5% last year to just 8.9%. And historically most of those ad dollars have flowed to portals and other online destinations, not experimental sites and social networks like Facebook. When Sheryl Sandberg arrived at Facebook, a substantial chunk of the company's revenues were still coming from a 2006 deal with Microsoft in which the software behemoth sold traditional banner ads on Facebook pages and the parties split the revenue.

But attempts to sell traditional online ads on Facebook and other social-networking sites have failed miserably: Banner ads can sell for as little as 15 cents per 1,000 clicks (compared with, say, $8 per 1,000 clicks for an ad on a targeted news portal such as Yahoo Auto) because marketers know that members ignore them.

Sandberg acknowledges that Facebook has much more work to do to secure advertisers. "What we have to figure out is, How do we build a monetization machine which is in keeping with what users are doing on the site?" she says. "It's about execution, doing things faster and better, getting more users and more advertisers."

Facebook's march to 200 million users began in earnest in January 2008. That's when the site made translation tools available to international users. Today more than 70% of Facebook users are outside the U.S., and most of them read it in their native language. But anecdotal evidence suggests that American baby-boomers have discovered Facebook in a big way: Some, like Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, use the site to keep an eye on their kids' online activities. Others are using it as a networking tool in a bad economy.

The fastest-growing demographic on the site? Women 55 and older, up 175% since September 2008. Cynics might say that if Granny is on Facebook, the site absolutely has jumped the shark. Quite the contrary: Having a broad swath of users is exactly what Zuckerberg wants. The arrival of an older, less web-centric crowd suggests that he has succeeded in making the site easy to use. And Facebook can't become a standardized platform if only cool kids use it.Besides, there doesn't currently seem to be another hot social-networking site that is drawing young users away from Facebook in large numbers.

But the Facebook juggernaut still could very easily go awry: Remember AOL's Instant Messenger? Teenagers lived on it and companies started using it in lieu of e-mail. But AOL never figured out a way to make money on it.

Facebook could meet a similar fate; indeed, it is a little worrisome that neither Zuckerberg nor Sandberg seems to feel any particular urgency about putting Facebook in the black. Zuckerberg prefers to leave the question of revenues to Sandberg, who punts: "I think what's really important is that we are able to fund our expansion, and we're very focused on that," she told me in mid-February. Investors seem pretty passive about it as well. Early board member Jim Breyer, who put in $1 million of his own money and $12.7 million from an Accel Partners fund, says that profits are "a secondary consideration in this stage of the growth." He wants to get a return on his investment, but he's not pushing anything now.

And then there's Microsoft, which is in the unusual position of being a Facebook owner, a partner, and, through its Windows Live social network, a competitor. Since taking a stake in Facebook, Microsoft has been working closely with the site to create links between Facebook and the Windows Live social network so that when members update their status message or upload photos on Facebook, that information appears on the Microsoft site too.

Facebook has influenced Microsoft in other ways. Its new operating system, OS 7, features a list of interactions, news, and information that happens to look a lot like Facebook's news feed. Could Microsoft end up buying Facebook outright? Both sides would have much to gain from the arrangement. Facebook investors could get their money out, and Microsoft, which has been searching for a way to deliver more of its software applications over the Internet, would own a viable online platform for selling a new generation of services.

But Zuckerberg, like that other famous technology-loving Harvard dropout, seems determined to create a business empire that touches virtually every computer user in the world. Zuckerberg's not interested in selling to Microsoft; he wants to build the next Microsoft. And with 175 million "friends," he's off to a helluva start.

REPORTER ASSOCIATE Beth Kowitt contributed to this article. Why relay this information? Because marketers need to know their target audience, so it's useful to study the demographics of each social network in order to appeal to them for residual income. You won't make money on the Internet if you don't. Businesses are to serve the public and give people what they want. Mentoring in a team is a powerful tool to pool resources and make faster progress! Reported by James McLellan

http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/programs.php?jcmcl812

(read more)

Facebook Taking Over Our Lives

How Facebook is taking over our lives

President Obama used it to get elected. Dell will recruit new hires with it. Microsoft's new operating system borrows from it. No question, Facebook has friends in high places. Can CEO Mark Zuckerberg make those connections pay off?

By Jessi Hempel, writer

LAST UPDATED: FEBRUARY 19, 2009: 10:51 AM ET

A digital world

Mark Zuckerberg has always liked to build things. I first spoke with him in the summer of 2005 when he was still crashing on a friend's couch in Menlo Park, Calif.? He was on his cellphone, pacing back and forth in the backyard as he explained his parents' reaction to his project: "The thing I made before Facebook almost got me kicked out of school," he said, referring to Facemash, a site that let people rate photos.

He went before the school's administrative board to answer questions about how he gathered data. "When I started making Facebook, [my parents] were, like, don't make another site." Then all his Harvard classmates - as well as students from the rest of the Ivy League - joined, and he spent the remainder of his college money on servers. So much for school.

Even in our initial interview, Zuckerberg was clear that he wasn't simply creating another online tool for college kids to check each other out. He called Facebook a "social utility" and explained that one day everyone would be able to use it to locate people on the web - a truly global digital phone book. And he also knew that if the site were easy to use, a combination of peer pressure and the so-called network effect would, like, totally kick in. Since that summer afternoon Zuckerberg has passed legal drinking age, found an apartment, accepted more than $400 million in venture capital, and attended the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, several times.

But Zuckerberg makes it clear to me that he's still intensely focused on connecting the entire world on Facebook - only now his vision goes well beyond the site as a digital phone book. It becomes the equivalent of the phone itself: It is the main tool people use to communicate for work and pleasure.

It also becomes the central place where members organize parties, store pictures, find jobs, watch videos, and play games. Eventually they'll use their Facebook ID as an online passkey to gain access to websites and online forums that require personal identification. In other words, Facebook will be where people live their digital lives, without the creepy avatars.

To achieve that goal Zuckerberg has brought in plenty of seasoned veterans, like Google's Sandberg, but he's also surrounded himself with young enthusiasts who share his view that Facebook can change the way people live and work. Like the early employees at Google, most won't see 30 for a long time. Pass by a receptionist, a straw-haired woman with funky glasses, and you'll notice she's updating her Facebook profile.

Stroll through the stretch of University Avenue in Palo Alto that houses the company's different offices (it is getting ready to consolidate operations in new digs in April) and you'll be able to differentiate the Facebook employees from the venture capitalists who toil in offices nearby: The Facebookers are the super-young brainiacs in ratty T-shirts and jeans.

At times it may seem hard to reconcile Zuckerberg's lofty aspirations for Facebook with the utterly commonplace content that users create on the site. Consider 25 Random Things, a new take on the chain letter that has grown so popular it was written up in the New York Times Style section. You list 25 supposedly random things about yourself and send the note on to 25 of your friends (who are supposed to do the same), but your randomness also ends up on display to any gawker who may be surfing your profile.

The items range from the banal (No. 17: I never, ever, ever throw up. Like five times in my adult life) to the intimate (No. 2: I knew I was gay in the sixth grade but didn't tell anyone until I was 19). The feature is high profile - some 37,500 lists sprang up in just two weeks - but taken as a whole it just seems like a lot of user-generated babble.

Yet it is that very babble that makes Facebook so valuable to marketers. Imagine if an advertiser had the ability to eavesdrop on every phone conversation you've ever had. In a way, that's what all the wall posts, status updates, 25 Random Things, and picture tagging on Facebook amount to: a semipublic airing of stuff people are interested in doing, buying, and trying.

Sure, you can send private messages using Facebook, and Zuckerberg eventually hopes to give you even more tools to tailor your profile so that the face you present to, say, your employer is very different from the way you look online to your college roommate. Just like in real life. But the running lists of online interactions on Facebook, known as "feeds," are what make Facebook different from other social networking sites - and they are precisely what make corporations salivate.

Comment: Why spread this information? Because each social network is different. Each has its own target audience. This you need to know so that you can set up residual income, money-making, in your Internet business. MySpace is utterly gigantic and Facebook is growing fast. So you need mentoring, especially from a team. A team knows more than each of its members.

Reported by James McLellan

http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/programs.php?jcmcl812 (read more)

residual|income|money|making|Internet|business

University of Michigan

Job insecurity takes toll on worker health

By Diane Swanbrow News Service Note: before this article it's helpful to recall that people need to secure their long-term future, even their physical and mental health, through residual income, probably through making money by an the Internet business.

Amid growing news of layoffs, outsourcing, corporate bankruptcies and downsizing, a U-M study finds that feeling about your job takes a toll on physical and mental health—whether you actually lose your job or not.

In fact, the health effects of job insecurity are at least as great as the health effects of a serious or life-threatening illness, according to a study of job insecurity and health in the United States that was to be presented April 1 at the annual meeting of the Population Association of America in Los Angeles.

The study is based on an analysis of data from a nationally representative, longitudinal survey conducted by the Institute for Social Research (ISR), and includes information on more than 1,000 men and women under the age of 60 who were interviewed twice, about three years apart.

"The strength of this study is that we not only have multiple measures of insecurity but we also have actual measures of job loss," says Sarah Burgard, a sociologist at ISR and the lead author of the study.

Since only those who remained employed at both points in time were included in the analysis, the findings are not attributable to health problems related to actual job loss and extended unemployment.

The research also controlled for major health shocks that occurred during the three-year period, and measured respondents' level of neuroticism, to control for the tendency of highly neurotic people to give low ratings of their mental and physical health, and of their job security.

"How likely is it that during the next couple of years you will involuntarily lose your main job?" participants were asked. Those who said "very likely" or "somewhat likely" were considered insecure, while those who replied "not too likely" or "not at all likely" were considered secure.

About 25 percent of respondents reported feeling insecure about their jobs in at least one of two interviews.

Burgard found that self-rated health was significantly lower for respondents who reported feeling insecure about their jobs. Compared to workers who felt secure at both interviews, those who were chronically insecure were about twice as likely to report physical health that was less than very good or excellent. She also found that private-sector employees were more vulnerable to the negative health effects of job insecurity than were public-sector employees.

Job insecurity took a particularly high toll on Black workers, the researchers found. Blacks who were chronically insecure about their jobs were nearly three times as likely as insecure whites and more than four times as likely as secure whites to report very high depressive symptoms.

As the U.S. labor market increasingly adds more nonstandard jobs with reduced hours and benefits, offering employers the flexibility to hire and fire to meet demand, the study suggests some of the fallout for workers.

Other studies have found that at least some concern about the possibility of losing their jobs has begun to affect a larger and more diverse fraction of the population. As increased flexibility in the labor market leaves increasing numbers of workers at all levels with concerns about the future of their positions, and the potential consequences of job loss continue to be substantial, job insecurity will only grow as a potentially potent risk to population health.

"Policy-makers may want to attend to differences in the likely consequences for some groups of workers, including African Americans and those in the private sector," Burgard says.

urgard's collaborators on the study are U-M researchers Jennie Brand and James House. Burgard and Brand both were supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Health & Society Scholars Program, and the data for the analysis were collected with support from grants from the National Institute on Aging and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Investigators in Health Policy Research Program

Submitted by James McLellan

http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/?jcmcl812 Reflect: some residual income through making money by an the Internet business is one of the solutions: you remain more independent of the market ups and down. Plenty of us are out there to help you market anything you are passionate about. (read more)

residual|income|money|

University of Michigan

Job insecurity takes toll on worker health

By Diane Swanbrow News Service Note: before this article it's helpful to recall that people need to secure their long-term future, even their physical and mental health, through residual income, probably through making money by an the Internet business.

Amid growing news of layoffs, outsourcing, corporate bankruptcies and downsizing, a U-M study finds that feeling about your job takes a toll on physical and mental health—whether you actually lose your job or not.

In fact, the health effects of job insecurity are at least as great as the health effects of a serious or life-threatening illness, according to a study of job insecurity and health in the United States that was to be presented April 1 at the annual meeting of the Population Association of America in Los Angeles.

The study is based on an analysis of data from a nationally representative, longitudinal survey conducted by the Institute for Social Research (ISR), and includes information on more than 1,000 men and women under the age of 60 who were interviewed twice, about three years apart.

"The strength of this study is that we not only have multiple measures of insecurity but we also have actual measures of job loss," says Sarah Burgard, a sociologist at ISR and the lead author of the study.

Since only those who remained employed at both points in time were included in the analysis, the findings are not attributable to health problems related to actual job loss and extended unemployment.

The research also controlled for major health shocks that occurred during the three-year period, and measured respondents' level of neuroticism, to control for the tendency of highly neurotic people to give low ratings of their mental and physical health, and of their job security.

"How likely is it that during the next couple of years you will involuntarily lose your main job?" participants were asked. Those who said "very likely" or "somewhat likely" were considered insecure, while those who replied "not too likely" or "not at all likely" were considered secure.

About 25 percent of respondents reported feeling insecure about their jobs in at least one of two interviews.

Burgard found that self-rated health was significantly lower for respondents who reported feeling insecure about their jobs. Compared to workers who felt secure at both interviews, those who were chronically insecure were about twice as likely to report physical health that was less than very good or excellent. She also found that private-sector employees were more vulnerable to the negative health effects of job insecurity than were public-sector employees.

Job insecurity took a particularly high toll on Black workers, the researchers found. Blacks who were chronically insecure about their jobs were nearly three times as likely as insecure whites and more than four times as likely as secure whites to report very high depressive symptoms.

As the U.S. labor market increasingly adds more nonstandard jobs with reduced hours and benefits, offering employers the flexibility to hire and fire to meet demand, the study suggests some of the fallout for workers.

Other studies have found that at least some concern about the possibility of losing their jobs has begun to affect a larger and more diverse fraction of the population. As increased flexibility in the labor market leaves increasing numbers of workers at all levels with concerns about the future of their positions, and the potential consequences of job loss continue to be substantial, job insecurity will only grow as a potentially potent risk to population health.

"Policy-makers may want to attend to differences in the likely consequences for some groups of workers, including African Americans and those in the private sector," Burgard says.

urgard's collaborators on the study are U-M researchers Jennie Brand and James House. Burgard and Brand both were supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Health & Society Scholars Program, and the data for the analysis were collected with support from grants from the National Institute on Aging and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Investigators in Health Policy Research Program

Submitted by James McLellan

http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/?jcmcl812 Reflect: some residual income through making money by an the Internet business is one of the solutions: you remain more independent of the market ups and down. Plenty of us are out there to help you market anything you are passionate about. (read more)

Residual|income|money|making|internet|business

University of Michigan

Job insecurity takes toll on worker health

By Diane Swanbrow News Service

Amid growing news of layoffs, outsourcing, corporate bankruptcies and downsizing, a U-M study finds that feeling insecure about your job takes a toll on physical and mental health—whether you actually lose your job or not.

In fact, the health effects of job insecurity are at least as great as the health effects of a serious or life-threatening illness, according to a study of job insecurity and health in the United States that was to be presented April 1 at the annual meeting of the Population Association of America in Los Angeles.

The study is based on an analysis of data from a nationally representative, longitudinal survey conducted by the Institute for Social Research (ISR), and includes information on more than 1,000 men and women under the age of 60 who were interviewed twice, about three years apart.

"The strength of this study is that we not only have multiple measures of insecurity but we also have actual measures of job loss," says Sarah Burgard, a sociologist at ISR and the lead author of the study.

Since only those who remained employed at both points in time were included in the analysis, the findings are not attributable to health problems related to actual job loss and extended unemployment.

The research also controlled for major health shocks that occurred during the three-year period, and measured respondents' level of neuroticism, to control for the tendency of highly neurotic people to give low ratings of their mental and physical health, and of their job security.

"How likely is it that during the next couple of years you will involuntarily lose your main job?" participants were asked. Those who said "very likely" or "somewhat likely" were considered insecure, while those who replied "not too likely" or "not at all likely" were considered secure.

About 25 percent of respondents reported feeling insecure about their jobs in at least one of two interviews.

Burgard found that self-rated health was significantly lower for respondents who reported feeling insecure about their jobs. Compared to workers who felt secure at both interviews, those who were chronically insecure were about twice as likely to report physical health that was less than very good or excellent. She also found that private-sector employees were more vulnerable to the negative health effects of job insecurity than were public-sector employees.

Job insecurity took a particularly high toll on Black workers, the researchers found. Blacks who were chronically insecure about their jobs were nearly three times as likely as insecure whites and more than four times as likely as secure whites to report very high depressive symptoms.

As the U.S. labor market increasingly adds more nonstandard jobs with reduced hours and benefits, offering employers the flexibility to hire and fire to meet demand, the study suggests some of the fallout for workers.

Other studies have found that at least some concern about the possibility of losing their jobs has begun to affect a larger and more diverse fraction of the population. As increased flexibility in the labor market leaves increasing numbers of workers at all levels with concerns about the future of their positions, and the potential consequences of job loss continue to be substantial, job insecurity will only grow as a potentially potent risk to population health.

"Policy-makers may want to attend to differences in the likely consequences for some groups of workers, including African Americans and those in the private sector," Burgard says.

urgard's collaborators on the study are U-M researchers Jennie Brand and James House. Burgard and Brand both were supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Health & Society Scholars Program, and the data for the analysis were collected with support from grants from the National Institute on Aging and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Investigators in Health Policy Research Program

Submitted by James McLellan

http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Home Business Scams

From , Dr. Richard Andrew Stera

This is a review organization for work-at-home opportunities.

He states: "I’m excited to announce that if you’re looking for a work at home opportunity, the following new information will save you months of grief and monetary loss… and instead guide you to the best, legitimate and guaranteed income-producing work at home opportunity for you! You see, over the last few months, I have commissioned what is to my knowledge the most extensive fraud investigation on the internet, evaluating work at home opportunities."

His team examined 173 work at home websites.

"For each website, a value (a percentile from 0-100) was assigned to each of these five criteria, and the five values were then added and divided by five to obtain an official SRA Overall Value for each work at home opportunity. (The SRA Overall Value is also a percentile from 0-100). The five key-essentials evaluated:

Return on Investment

Money Making Potential

Ease of use and implementation

Privacy Protection

Customer Service

81.6% Were Found To Be Scams!

81.6% of the websites (141 out of the 173) ranked so low in our evaluation (an SRA Overall Value below 65%) that they were labeled as scams, i.e. absolutely not recommended. These websites have many things in common, including:

No real opportunity to quickly achieve the income desired

A lack of detailed information

Not simple and easy

Out-dated information

Links that lead you to other sites asking for more money

Non-working links

No real opportunity to quickly achieve the income desired

A lack of detailed information

The reality is that the hopes and dreams of honest people trying to make a better life for themselves are being preyed upon and shattered, day-in and day-out. Our latest findings indicate the average person looking for a legitimate work at home opportunity loses an average of $1,785 to scammers’ pockets. And the time wasted, the grief endured, and the lost income you could have made while falling prey to such scams is immeasurable.

"Perhaps you have fallen victim to such scams. If so, I know how it feels because my wife Susan too was a victim of work at home scams. It caused my family tremendous grief at a difficult time, when my wife left her job to care for our newborn children. Losing her income put us into financial burden, and we spent many months struggling to find a legitimate work at home opportunity for her. That’s why I first joined SiteReviewAuthority, getting actively involved in helping people struggling with the same issues, and later being appointed chairman of the organization.

32 of the 173 websites we reviewed (18.4% of them) were researched, tested, and determined to be legitimate, safe, and to deliver on their moneymaking promises!

Now all of us want to get solid, predictable, lasting residual income, we need to upgrade our lifestyle. We want to protect ourselves from the vagaries of the marketplace and

and from every form of scam. At least Dr. Stera provides us with some examination criteria that we can apply to new opportunities presented us and teach to others, to protect them.

Submitted by James McLellan. http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Belief in American Dream

The American Dream Is Still Strong

John Zogby, 01.29.09, 12:00 AM EST

It's dipped but marches on, despite the recession. It takes a lot to blunt the optimism of the American people, and this recession has certainly put a dent on our outlook. However, when we measure how people feel about their long-term goals in life, it is remarkable how optimistic they remain.

At Zogby International, one unique way we measure those attitudes is by asking whether people believe they and their families can achieve the American Dream. In December, I wrote about the growing number of people who see the American Dream as a measure of spiritual, rather than material, achievement. Given the hard economic times, let's look more closely at its financial dimensions.

Over a two-month period, separate Zogby Interactive polls found the percentage of likely voters saying they believe in the American Dream dropped from 67% immediately after the election to 56% in the second week of January. Anytime you see a dip of 11 points over such a short period, you know something significant is happening.

Yet, I am even more struck that a majority still believes they can realize the American Dream during a time that many say is the worst since the Great Depression. There was not a single demographic group we measure (age, income, race, religious habits, etc.) where the plurality did not express this belief. The near exception was among those with family incomes of $25,000 to $35,000, who were equally as likely to believe they could achieve the dream (36.6%) as to say it does not exist (36.6%).

What motivates our citizenry to see that ideal within reach when banks are failing and jobs are being shed by all sorts of businesses? In an early January Zogby Interactive poll of nearly 3,500 likely voters, we offered reasons why they might believe or disbelieve in their chances of achieving the American Dream and asked them to choose the two that most applied.

We found that the objective reality of their current job or financial situation was often secondary. For believers, faith in themselves and the American ideal of opportunity for those who want it ranked highest. Those who said the American Dream did not exist were most likely to blame the powerful who didn't care about them. Next was rejection of the idea of U.S. exceptionalism.

Here are the top reasons for believing in the national dream:

59%: "I'm intelligent and work hard, so I should succeed."
52%: "America is the land of opportunity."
25%: "I am an optimist."
25%: "I have a secure job or business."
15%: "My religious faith insures I will find fulfillment."
2%: Not sure or other.

Submitted by James McLellan
http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/?jcmcl812 (read more)

Master Key System

Contribution by James McLellan

Millions have purchased the movie, "The Secret." Of course, it is well made. What is not well known is that it is based upon a work by Charles Haanel from the early twentieth century, "The Master Key." Contribution by James McLellan

You receive twenty-four .mp3 audios. When you hear it the first time, you are inspired. Do not think that the transformation it empowers comes quickly: it cannot, since you remake your very self when you follow its instructions.

It sinks it gradually. Don't expect quick results: that is just impossible. It's a kind of rebirth. You are the primary product of this process, YOU are transformed, you gain self-mastery, you learn to fully utilize your subconscious to get what you want and need, as long as it does not happen at other people's expense.

You set change and improvement in motion. It takes time, it is not magic, though some people get that impression from the movie itself.

Thereby you become not just another employee dependent upon the whim of an all-powerful employer and a fickle marketplace. You discover what you can uniquely offer people.

You learn to discriminate between an illusory quick fix and true self-reliance. Join us: we can help, and introduce you to the best online marketing system, Veretekk itself. Enjoy: it will help you immensely. All the while you learn in order to earn AND you grow as you absorb The Master Key.

Join Me to Receive the MasterKey for Free

(read more)

Cyber Espionage

Putting A Price On Cyberspying>

> Andy Greenberg, 01.29.09>

A study by Purdue researchers paints a picture of a world economy plagued by costly digital espionage.In the murky world of cyber espionage, the spied-upon are often just as silent as the spies. Even as governments publicize the problem of intellectual property theft by digital intruders, few companies' chief information officers will admit they've been targeted.

But question those CIOs anonymously, and their candid answers begin to sketch the size of the problem: A hemorrhaging breach in research and development secrets that, in the last year, may have added up to roughly $4.6 million in lost or stolen intellectual property per company.

That's the number released Thursday in a study performed by Purdue's Krannert School of Management and funded by security software firm McAfee (nyse: MFE - news - people ). The study queried nearly 800 CIOs about the value of their IP lost to hackers and insider thieves in 2008.

Of those surveyed, more than 119 respondents said they'd had intellectual property, including research and development or other strategic data, stolen. And the estimated value of those victims' lost data added up to nearly $559 million over the last year, or $4.6 million per company, with 3% of the firms reporting stolen data worth $50 million or more.

Purdue's results shed some light on a dark corner of information security: While practically every U.S. state has passed a law forcing companies to disclose data spillage incidents involving customer or employee data that could lead to identity theft, other types of data loss have been far less scrutinized.

The stealing of trade secrets or other strategic intellectual property is rarely reported, as executives worry that publicizing a breach could attract more cyberspies looking for network vulnerabilities or even lead to shareholder lawsuits.

Purdue's estimate of that lost IP's value is only a vague outline of the problem, admits Karthik Krannan, a professor in Purdue's Center for Education and Research in Information Assurance and Security. But it's a start. "Because companies don't disclose any of this information publicly, we don't have precise information," Krannan says. "But it's at least an approximate value that you can put your finger on. Even if it were half of this, it would be a huge number in terms of intellectual property lost in a single year."

In fact, the real value of stolen IP worldwide may be far higher, says Scott Borg, director and chief economist at the U.S. Cyber Consequences Unit (USCCU), a nonprofit organization that communicates between the private sector and government on cybersecurity issues.

"When companies think of intellectual property, they're thinking only of things they hire lawyers to protect," says Borg. "But all kinds of other information, from e-mails to engineering techniques, is being stolen, and it takes a lot of efficient analysis to determine the real size of the problem."

The consequences of all that data leakage could reach far beyond any single company, potentially affecting entire national economies, Borg says. "A new processing plant in Southeast Asia can, on day one, have a level of sophistication that it took a U.S. company six years to gain," he says. "That's making a huge difference economically."

Borg says his organization has been tracking cyberspying against private companies since around 2004, when his group's investigation into potential cyberwarfare targets revealed what seemed to be digital snooping in the networks of U.S. utilities. (Borg declined to name any specific targets.)

Since then, others have sounded the same alarm bell: In September 2007, Alan Paller, the director of the SANS Institute, told Forbes.com that each of the top 10 U.S. defense contractors--including Boeing (nyse: BA - news - people ), Lockheed Martin (nyse: LMT - news - people ), Northrup Grumman and Raytheon (nyse: RTN - news - people )--had been hacked.

Two months later, the British intelligence group MI-5 sent a note to 300 British companies warning them about Chinese cyberspying against Western companies.

Purdue's study, which surveyed companies globally, didn't deal with the source of the spying incidents. But it did address CIOs' perceptions of which countries represented an information security threat as an outsourcing destination.

Russia, Pakistan and China ranked lowest in terms of trust as IT contractors, with 26% of respondents reporting that they'd avoid giving sensitive information to a Chinese firm and 27% percent distrusting Pakistani contractors.

CIOs also reported a growing fear of IP theft as a result of the global recession, as laid off employees carry proprietary data to sell to competitors or to offer to companies in a bid to make themselves more employable. Forty-two percent of the survey's respondents said they felt their company faced an increased threat from those insider thefts as a result of the economic downturn.

In the better-understood world of customer or employee data breaches, there's evidence that those insider threats are rising. During 2008, employee-perpetrated information theft incidents accounted for more than 15% of all reported cases of personal data spills, double the proportion in 2007. And those documented employee theft cases were most prevalent in the financial services industry, where layoffs have hit especially hard. (See: "Banking's Data Security Crisis.")

One such insider espionage incident may have gone public in September, when former Intel (nasdaq: INTC - news - people ) engineer Biswahoman Pani was indicted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation for downloading files containing CAD drawings of a processor under development with the intent of giving the files to his new employer, Advanced Micro Devices (nyse: AMD - news - people ).

Pani had received a "below expectations" rating in his most recent evaluation at Intel, according to an FBI affidavit--a sign that recession-fueled job pressure may have contributed to the attempted IP espionage.

Domestic espionage incidents like those, says USCCU's Borg, may not shift the balance of intellectual power worldwide, but they undermine the U.S. economy nonetheless. "Even if it's just domestic, this takes resources away from the companies that develop the information and gives it to those whose capability is willingness to steal," says Borg. "You want to reward companies that create data, not the ones that steal it."

Submitted by James McLellan

(read more)

Retail Industry in Crisis

The retail industry's crisis isn't getting the kind of government attention being showered on the nation's automakers.

Monthly store sales have declined for six straight months. In the midst of the longest recession in decades, the industry has lost more than three times the 163,000 manufacturing jobs shed by the auto industry last year.

Marshal Cohen, chief retail analyst with NPD Group, said he's especially concerned about this significant erosion of retailing jobs. Unlike with the auto industry, Cohen fears the issue of retail job losses either isn't getting its fair share of attention from Washington or keeps "getting swept under the rug." "When the industry is losing 34,000 jobs every couple of weeks, you better pay attention," Cohen said.

He was referring to Circuit City's announcement last week that the electronics retailer, which employs 34,000 people in the United States, was going out of business. J.C. Penney (JCP, Fortune 500) CEO Mike Ullman, too, expressed his concerns about inadequate attention being paid to the accelerating pace of retail job cuts. "Retailers are the largest group of private employers in the country," Ullman said during a panel discussion last week at the National Retail Federation's (NRF) annual convention in New York.

"We lost twice the number of workers last year than automakers and we hired 45% fewer holiday workers last year," he said. "If that doesn't (press) the point, I don't know what would." Said Cohen, "Consumer spending at retailers fuels 75% of the economy. So you have to make sure these people have jobs.

"If not, the ramifications are so overarching that it's enough to put the economy in a tailspin," he said. "These people losing jobs are full-time workers, part-time workers, college kids, senior citizens. They aren't only employees. They are consumers and taxpayers too."

Scott Hoyt, senior director of consumer economics for Moody's Economy.com, said he doesn't have a "good answer" as to why the the retailing industry hasn't been as effective as other industries in highlighting the issue of escalating jobs losses.

"If we put it in perspective, although the number of actual jobs lost in retailing is much bigger, the percentage of the total is not as high as for the auto industry," Hoyt said. The retailing sector employed 15 million Americans in 2008 versus 800,000 jobs in the U.S. auto manufacturing industry, according to the Labor Department.

But auto manufacturing jobs fell 16.9% last year while total retail jobs fell 3.2%. Government data showed more than half of retail job losses came in the last four months of the year with the biggest cuts occurring among auto dealers, furniture stores, electronics and appliance sellers. However, retailing was also the third biggest employer after the government and the services sector. At the same time, retail jobs typically are lower-paying jobs, Hoyt said.

"[Therefore] the amount of consumer spending power lost [from a retail job] is probably not as significant to the economy as a higher paying job," he said. Still, he maintained that in this recession "any job is still better than no job." Burt Flickinger, managing director with consulting firm Strategic Resources Group, argued that the retail industry is overstored and overemployed and perhaps has itself to blame for its recent woes.

>What's more, Peter Capelli, director of the Wharton Center for Human Resources, said Washington has been more responsive to the turbulence in the auto industry for other reasons. "Auto jobs and sales are being lost to foreign competitors," Capelli said.

"This industry used to be 90% domestic. Less than half of it is now domestic. The retailing industry is largely domestic."

But perhaps the biggest difference between two industries - retail and auto - is union representation. While 50% of the U.S. auto industry is unionized, the retail industry is largely anti-union. Industry watchers estimate that only about 6% of the retail industry has union representation.

"It's fairly clear about why retailers haven't been effective in highlighting the jobs issue. This is a non-union industry that lacks a strong lobbying voice in Washington," said Theresa Williams, director of the Center of Education & Research in Retailing at the Indiana University Kelley School of Business.

NPD's Cohen agreed with Williams. "First, there is no single organization that is in the forefront speaking for [retail] employees," he said, adding that the NRF, the industry's largest trade group, has been ineffective on this front. "This industry has nothing in comparison to the prominence, exposure and connectivity to D.C. as does he auto industry."

For its part, the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU) said in a statement to CNNMoney.com Thursday that the issue of retail job losses "is bigger than retail sales and consumer spending." "Tens of thousands of retail workers are left to wonder how they're going to pay for their homes, their health care and provide for their families," said Paul Karr with RWDSU "Our union is working closely with retail workers to provide unemployment training to help folks navigate that system while they look for work. But more important than training are jobs," Karr said. "The only way to do that is to stimulate the economy and get money into people's hands."

NRF spokeswoman Ellen Davis agreed that retailers "collectively need to talk about not only what's happening to their sales but also their workers."By its own estimates, the NRF maintains that the industry has more than 1.6 million retail establishments, employing more than 24 million workers.

"One in five American workers are employed in the retailing industry in full-time, part-time and seasonal jobs," Davis said. "This is a story that's not being told." "We are watching the situation closely and we think the more than 500,000 jobs lost [last year] is just the tip of the iceberg," she said.

To her point, the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) estimates that as many as 148,000 retail establishments - both public and private - will go out of business in 2009, possibly impacting more than 600,000 jobs in 2009. Just this month, five more retail chains filed for bankruptcy, adding to the more than 27 retail chains that filed for bankruptcy - including some that eventually liquidated - in 2008.

"It used to be that if you lose a job at J.C. Penney, you could apply for a job at Macy's," Cohen said. "But that's not the case now."Regarding Cohen's criticism of the NRF, Davis said the agency has "tried to be a voice on the [jobs] issue. But sometimes the conversation falls on deaf ears." That's not good enough for Cohen. "Yes, the industry can absorb some of these store closures and job losses but you can't expect it to absorb the entire burden of the economy," he said.

While a "bailout" like the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program for banks may not be feasible for retailers, Cohen said the industry still needs some kind of urgent assistance. "We need to find a way to assist these store workers who have lost their jobs and get them back in the workforce," he said.

First Published: January 21, 2009: 1:10 PM ET

Submitted by James McLellan
http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/programs.php?jcmcl812

(read more)

Recession and Residual Income

Posted by: InsiderPerks

"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free..." In her poem The New Colossus, Emma Lazarus created what stood for years as the American credo.

Free? In this economy? Let's face it.. it's getting ugly out there. Declining gross domestic product, increased military spending, growing unemployment, Rising food prices due to higher energy costs.. Does any of this sound familiar?

It's time to ask yourself some important questions. Have you started cutting back on life's little splurges? Do you ever worry about a downturn in your employer's business, or a possible layoff? Have you had to forget about this year's vacation plans? Do you have trouble stretching your paycheck to cover your monthly responsibilities? Have you found yourself worrying about putting together a college fund for your kids? Or about having anything for retirement?

If you are answering yes to any of these questions.. you are not alone. Which is why many economists and financial experts say that we have officially entered a recession.

So what about you? Has your family been affected by the weaker dollar, higher prices and rising unemployment? If you have, you've probably thought, "Well, what can I do about it?"

Less than year ago, Aaron Veverka was looking for a new home. He lived in a small apartment in Brooklyn, OH a small suburb of Cleveland, OH. The apartment had already gotten crowded a few years back when he fell in love with his future wife Kendra. So when they heard the news of a brand new baby on the way, they knew that had to act quickly and secure a place for their new addition to grow up.

Aaron and Kendra set out on a mission. They began searching ads and real estate magazines. searching for their dream home. They'd always dreamed of living out their lives in a beautiful but modest home in Brooklyn, OH but they quickly found that the prices in Brooklyn at the time were just beyond their reach. They had a decision to make. They could take out a risky loan and take their chances with an adjustable rate mortage or they could settle for a smaller house, in Old Brooklyn, live within their means, and save the extra money for their new baby who was quickly on his way.

They talked it over for weeks. They compared the good and the bad, the advantages of living in a better neighborhood versus the money they would save by compromising for the time being. Eventually they decided, because of the rising energy costs and subprime mortage controversy to move into a "fixer upper" in Old Brooklyn.

But that wasn't enough. The down payment and insurance on the home, coupled with the moving costs and the initial expense of making the improvements needed to the home before they could move in, almost drove the cost of the smaller home into the range of that dream home they had wanted in Brooklyn.

Their situation became a little more desperate when Kendra's hours were cut at work. Then Aaron didn't get the raise he expected at work. Suddenly the happy couple found themselves in hard times in the midst of a recession.

"The way I saw it, I had four options," Aaron told me. "One, I could panic.. sell my house and move back into the apartment.. Two, I could wait it out and hope for the best.. Three, I could get a second job.. Or four, I could take control of my own destiny."

There is something you can do, there is action you can take, to recession proof your income. What kind of action? "Consider this," Aaron asked me, "What if I told you that for a minimal investment, you could own your own business. A business you could operate part time, and that could substantially supplement or even ultimately replace your current income?"

Well, there is a business like that. It uses a business model with a proven record, that has made thousands of people millionaires, and that has continued to grow steadily in good economic times and bad.

"I'm talking about an independent opportunity in the direct selling industry." I looked at Aaron and would have laughed if he hadn't been so serious. I wasn't a salesman.. I had never been in a direct selling business before, let alone owned my own company.. But what he said perked my interest.

"Don't take my word for it," he said, "A US Federal Reserve survey, shows that the average household net worth for self-employed persons is 5 times more than traditionally employed persons. It's about sharing more than selling, in the same way you recommend a good movie or restaurant to a friend. Only here, you can earn real money doing it."

By adding that extra income, by bolstering up your savings, you begin to recession proof your income and your life. That's why noted business author Robert Kiyosaki said, "The #1 thing people can do to increase their wealth is to start a part-time business." Donald Trump said, "Network marketing has proven itself to be a viable and rewarding source of income."

I did my research and found over 15 million people in the U.S. alone participate in direct selling businesses. U.S. sales in direct selling total over $32 Billion dollars annually. These are primarily home-based businesses started by people like you. In fact, here's what Paul Zane Pilser, one of the country's most respected business authors, has to say about home-based direct selling businesses...

"We're in the midst of a boom in home-based businesses, and it shows no signs of slowing. I like the honesty about direct selling; because it openly tells people the way to get rich is with residual income: Get paid again tomorrow for something you did yesterday."

To recession proof your income and protect the things that are truly important to you, you have to take control and seize the opportunity when you see it. To own your own business for a minimal investment in an industry that is 15 million people strong and generates over $32 billion dollars a year in revenue.. well, that doesn't sound very much like a recession at all.

Reported by James McLellan

http://200blueprint.com/r/jcmcl812/freereport (read more)

Job Losses Continue

Jobs: Worst in 5 years

Comment: many people do not draw personal conclusions from such a state of affairs, do not see the need to make money from some Internet business that suits them. They need mentoring, preferably in a team. Residual income will make the difference and protect their future and that of their children, if they pass along their skills.

By Chris Isidore, CNNMoney.com senior writer
Last Updated: October 3, 2008: 12:00 PM ET

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Employers made deeper cuts in their payrolls in September, according to the Labor Department's monthly jobs report, as the economy experienced the biggest drop in jobs in more than five years.

There was a net loss of 159,000 jobs in September, the ninth straight month the U.S. economy has lost jobs. The August job loss was revised to 73,000 jobs, taking year-to-date job losses to 760,000.

"This marks a clear downshift in the economy," said Robert Dye, senior economist with PNC Financial Services Group.

He pointed out that the September job loss is roughly twice the 75,000 average level seen in the first eight months of the year. The September jobs report loss, coupled with other recent economic readings and the credit crisis among the nation's banks and Wall Street firms, all point to deeper job cuts and recession conditions at least through the spring of 2009, he said.

The unemployment rate remained at 6.1%, the same level as August and in line with economists' forecast.

Economists surveyed by Briefing.com had forecast the loss of 105,000 jobs in the month. It was the largest monthly job loss total since March 2003, when payrolls were down 212,000, and the second-largest decline since the months that followed the Sept. 11 terrorist attack in late 2001.

Job losses were again widespread. Manufacturing lost 51,000 jobs while construction employment shrank further by 35,000 jobs. But retailers also trimmed payrolls by 40,000 workers, and the leisure and hospitality industries cut 17,000 jobs.

Professional and business services, a catch-all category seen by some as a proxy for overall economic activity, had a 27,000 drop in employment.

The only two major sectors to post gains were government, which added 9,000 jobs, and education and health services, in which employment grew by 25,000. Government hiring has stayed strong throughout the downturn, as the private sector has now lost nearly a million jobs since December, when employers started cutting back.

But even at many government offices, payrolls are shrinking as the slowing economy and rising fuel prices earlier in the year led to budget cuts. State and local governments cut 18,000 jobs in the month, outside of education. The gains in the public sector jobs came at schools and state colleges, as well as the federal government, which added nearly 7,000 jobs

In another sign of weakness, the average hourly work week slipped by 0.1 hour to 33.6 hours. And a modest 3-cent gain in the average hourly salary, combined with the shorter week, means that the average weekly paycheck fell by 81 cents to $610.51. Both the work week and hourly wage gains were weaker than forecasts.

"Incomes being crimped will feed back to weaken spending. And that will feed back into more job losses," said Robert Brusca of FAO Economics. "It is vicious circle time."

The combination of the smaller payrolls and the shorter work week means that the total hours worked by all private sector employees declined for the sixth straight month.

John Silvia, chief economist of Wachovia, said that's another sign of a recession because fewer total hours on the job generally means lower output. But he said the declining hours and wages could open the door for the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates later this year, perhaps as soon as its Oct. 28-29 meeting. Other economists say a cut could even come before the next meeting. PNC's Dye said he's looking for at least a half-percentage point cut by the end of the month.

"At this point, if we're going off a cliff, a (quarter-percentage) point cut doesn't seem to be worth doing," he said.

While the unemployment rate did not increase, other measures of the number of workers without the jobs they wanted rose. Those working part-time jobs because they couldn't find full-time work or their hours had been cut back due to slack conditions jumped by 337,000 people to 6.1 million.

The so-called under-employment rate, which counts those part-time workers, as well as those without jobs who have become discouraged and stopped looking for work, rose to 11% from from 10.7%. That's the highest rate in that measure since April 1994.

And as bad as the government report was for those seeking work, there are worries among economists that worse readings lay ahead.

The report is based on surveys of employers and households conducted in the week of Sept. 8 to 12, a period before the worst of the current financial crisis hit Wall Street. That crisis caused banks to hoard cash and cut back on credit extended to businesses.

Fears that the credit crunch will cause widespread job losses and a severe downturn in the already struggling economy prompted Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke to push for a $700 billion Wall Street bailout.

The measure, which passed the Senate Wednesday night, goes before the House on Friday. The House rejected a similar measure Monday.

Economists agree that even if the measure passes, it's very possible the future employment reports will show an even greater loss of jobs due to the credit crunch this month.

"The job losses are accelerating and the credit crunch is adding fuel to the fire," said Sung Won Sohn, an economics professor at Cal State University Channel Islands. "This recession could be deeper and longer than expected."

This is the last employment report before the Nov. 4 election. Both presidential candidates said the report is a sign that the U.S. worker needs help, but both claimed they have the proper solution while their opponent's policies would add to the job losses.

Republican John McCain argued that government budget and tax cuts, greater domestic energy production and more free trade agreements are the key to producing more jobs.

"I do not believe we will create one single American job by increasing taxes, going on a massive spending binge, and closing off markets," he said in a statement.

Democrat Barack Obama said it is necessary for Congress to pass a new economic stimulus package to help local and state governments avoid budget cuts and provide immediate tax relief for middle class workers.

"This country can't afford Senator McCain's plan to give America four more years of the same policies that have devastated our middle-class and our economy for the last eight," he said in his statement.


Presented by James McLellan Mentor

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Baby Boomers Face Financial Insecurity II

Title--

Baby Boomers Financial Insecurity II

--Title

Stanford University News Service (415) 723-2558

This must be cited as the source of the data. Reported by James McLellan

Given all the factors involved, however, Shoven said it will most likely be difficult for future economists to figure out after the fact what role the baby boom retirement actually played. "My bet at this point is that this underlying force will be felt in the economy, but lots of other things will be felt also."

It is, of course, even more difficult to predict who exactly will benefit and who will lose from such an underlying force. Some of the adjustment will likely come in the form of reduced demand for investment capital as well as in the form of inducing people to save by offering assets at reduced prices.

One positive way of looking at a drop in asset prices that reduces baby boomers' retirement income, he said, is that "the generation behind them who will, in all likelihood, face higher tax rates to support the large elderly population, at least will be able to accumulate assets for their own retirement on attractive terms."

"Some of the assets will undoubtedly be purchased by the so-called Generation X members, but they are, of course, less numerous than the baby boomers. Some of the assets may be bought by households in other countries, but most developed countries, particularly in Europe and Japan, will also be experiencing an unprecedentedly large cohort of elderly.

"Maybe the economies of China and Eastern Europe will be a source of world saving and they will be buying the financial assets that pensions will be offering on the market, but that seems like an unlikely bet."

The federal government could help, he said, by running a surplus, or firms could reduce their need for external financing by retaining more earnings, but those seem unlikely scenarios also.

"What seems most plausible is that the assets that the pension systems will be selling will have to be discounted to clear markets until a sufficient demand is generated from younger Americans."

Baby boom's historical burden
For the baby boomers, however, particularly the younger ones, retirement presents the same sort of uncertainty that their numbers have generated all along, Shoven said. "They tend to disrupt institutions in each phase of their lives."

One of their first impacts was more crowded schools. Primary school enrollments grew by 70 percent between 1951 and 1954 and then remained high for 15 years. The number of students in high schools and colleges and universities also surged when the baby boom generation reached the appropriate ages.

The baby boomers next caused the labor force to grow rapidly in the 1970s - at a rate of almost 2.5 percent per year compared to 0.8 percent in the first four years of the 1990s. "It is almost certainly not coincidental that the growth of real wages was low during the period in which labor markets were asked to absorb so many new entrants," Shoven said.

Some analysts also attribute the increase in the relative price of housing during the 1970s to the baby boomers' reaching the house-buying stage, he said, and in their old age, they can be expected to influence everything from medical care to the price of certain types of homes popular for retirement.

Once again, the younger part of the baby boom may bear the brunt.

"When someone born in 1946 retires, there will still be a 53-year- old baby boomer gearing up for retirement by accumulating assets as fast as he or she can. On the other hand, when the 53-year-old becomes 65 and looks to see if there is a 50-year-old to buy theirs, they've got to look at the baby bust generation." If asset markets begin anticipating the baby boom's retirement, however, older baby boomers also may get lower returns than people who are retiring now.

Planning for uncertainty
Individuals, employers, pension fund managers and public policy makers should begin to take these considerations into account in their planning, Shoven said. To the government, he suggests:

  • Easing regulations that limit pension contributions. "Right now we have a lot of tax rules that try to make sure that people aren't saving too much. I think those are ridiculous."
  • Better informing the public about the advantages of saving through information fliers accompanying Social Security statements.
  • Restructuring Social Security so that it is viable over the long run. The most recent forecast indicates the system faces bankruptcy in 2029 if it is not modified. Adjustments made sooner rather than later mean they will have to be less draconian, Shoven said, and will allow baby boomers sufficient time to adjust their saving accordingly. Revisions could include a further advancing of the age for the collection of full benefits, a lifting of the income levels subject to taxes for Social Security, increases in the tax rates or reduction in the benefit formula.

Employers should take different actions depending on their situation. Those who fund defined benefit plans should examine whether they have put aside enough to cover their commitments. If they cannot cover them, Shoven said, taxpayers "could get caught holding the bag" the way they did in the savings and loan crisis because of government guarantees.

Employers with defined contribution plans should examine the adequacy of their contribution rates and those of their employees. In defined contribution plans, employers and employees contribute to retirement funds that are invested by the individual employees, who are not guaranteed a particular retirement benefit but rather the returns on their investment.

Employers without pension arrangements for their employees should "make available, at least on a voluntary basis, all the tax-deferred saving opportunities that the Treasury Department allows." About half of American workers have no retirement pension at all.

Individual members of the baby boom should:

  • Consider increasing their saving rates because of the uncertainty.
  • Hold their wealth in a diversified manner.
  • Take advantage of all tax-deferred retirement plans available, such as individual retirement accounts.

Some studies have indicated that individuals who manage their own retirement plans are too conservative in their investing. Investing in Treasury bills, guaranteed investment contracts and money market instruments is "probably too conservative for people investing for retirement purposes," Shoven said. "Treasury bonds are not safe when you think of inflation, so I personally would rather see people invest in equities until the government issues inflation-indexed bonds.

"If you really want to diversify, you ought to have some international investments as well as domestic investments, but a diversified portfolio of stocks with some exposure in bonds is what I have in mind for most people."

Finally, he said, he would urge individuals to seek "an hour or two of professional advice" because situations vary greatly and retirement decisions are "frighteningly complex," especially when health care costs are considered.

"Typically in a defined contribution plan, you've got several hundred thousand dollars set aside, but how do you know if that is enough?" he said. "You are financing the rest of your life and this is one area where you don't get a second chance. You've got to get it right the first time."

Stanford University News Service warns: private pensions, individual savings and social security are in jeopardy for baby boomers. The private pension system will face trouble when too many baby boomers, born 1946-1964, want to cash in pension assets. Decline in asset earnings could be one-third. Pension fund investments and individual IRAs have provided investment capital for national growth. From 2010 on saving from the pension system starts to fall and by 2024 the system will be a seller system. Not that these are the only economic factors in play. Younger people will face higher taxes to support the elderly. Large numbers of the elderly will grow in Europe and Japan, too. The government could ease rules limiting pension contributions. Tell people to save more. Social security, if not reformed, could be bankrupt in 2029. People can save wealth in diverse ways. And take advantage of all legal tax-deferred retirement plans. Perhaps international as well as domestic investments, various tocks and some bonds. An hour of professional advice would help most.

Does this have any impact upon you? A HBB is one way to build for the future, even if it takes several years to protect you and your family.

If you want reliable, detailed online business training, go to:
www.mastersprg.com/theProgram.mast?EF324A

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Baby Boomers Face Financial Insecurity

Stanford University News Service (415) 723-2558 This must be cited as the source of the data.

Baby boomers face uncertainty regarding retirement income

STANFORD -- First they strained the schools, then the job and housing markets. Now, baby boomers are being warned that their sheer numbers could reduce the three main sources of their retirement income: private pensions, individual savings and Social Security. Their retirement also could negatively affect the capital available for the nation's economic growth.

Forecasts of potential problems with future Social Security benefits have been available for some time, but until recently, no one had attempted to calculate and publish similar estimates for private retirement savings. Stanford University economist John Shoven and Sylvester Schieber of the Wyatt Corp. undertook the task of producing a comparable 75-year-outlook for the private pension system.

They find that the private pension system also faces potential problems when the time comes that there are more baby boomers wanting to cash in their pension assets than younger buyers wanting to purchase them. The selling price for individual investments in assets also would be affected.

"The question that begs to be answered is who is going to be buying the assets that the pension funds [and individual investors] will be selling and at what prices?" Shoven said.

"The answers are not obvious, and probably all one can say is that there is extra uncertainty about asset prices during the baby boom's retirement years. It doesn't seem too much of a stretch to think that something like the housing price run-up of the 1970s will be played out in reverse in the second and third decades of the next century, although this time the assets affected could be stocks, long-term bonds, houses and perhaps even gold."

Shoven, dean of Stanford's School of Humanities and Sciences and the Charles Schwab Professor of Economics, said he is not suggesting that the price of stocks, bonds and other assets will go down in value as we approach the retirement of the baby boom generation, but that "returns will likely not be as high as they have been in the last decade."

A decline in asset earnings might be as high as one-third, he said, which is not a Depression-level drop but similar to the 1970s, when stocks were selling for one-third less than they were worth in terms of the cost of replacing the factories, trucks, computers and so forth that stockholders owned.

The baby boom refers to the large bulge of U.S. citizens born between 1946 and 1964. The largest demographic event for the United States in this century also may turn out to be the largest one for the next century, when the baby boom generation retires, Shoven said.

The impact of the baby boom retirement extends beyond individual baby boomers to the entire economy, he said, because pension fund investments and individual savings for retirement have provided much of the cash available for borrowing by industry and government. Investment capital is necessary for national economic growth.

Under the influence of the baby boom, pension assets have grown from less than 2 percent of national wealth in 1950 to almost 25 percent by the end of 1993.

"In the whole period since World War II, the funded pension systems in the United States have been large net buyers of financial securities such as stocks and bonds," Shoven said. "Pension assets have grown more rapidly than any other form of wealth and now total approximately $4.5 trillion."

To put that number in perspective, he said, "it is of the same order of magnitude as the value of all of the residential real estate in the country."

For the next 15 years or so, the private pension system will continue to be a major source of saving for the U.S. economy, but when the baby boomers begin to retire in large numbers, the pension funds combined may for the first time become net sellers, rather than buyers, of assets. Under the assumptions used in their forecast, Shoven said, the saving generated by the pension system begins to fall precipitously starting about 2010, and the system becomes a net seller by 2024.

Forecast speculative

The forecast is "speculative in the extreme," he warned, because there are factors ranging from earthquakes and hurricanes to tax reform, from a new wave of mergers or immigration to changes in birth and death rates that can affect such a long-range forecast. Some economists also may argue that various asset markets are already taking the retirement factor into account because buyers and sellers have foresight.

"I doubt that markets have 30 years of foresight," Shoven said, "but I wouldn't be surprised to see this as a somewhat dampening factor [on asset prices] to some extent as early as the first decade of the 21st century."

Segment I. Reported by James McLellan> http://www.crazyfoxes-marketing-group.com/programs.php?jcmcl812 (read more)

turbobiz

February 1st, 2009 admin

Sales Lead Generation Online RSS Feed System


A message from...
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Welcome Moyn Keim to our Veretekk SEO team!

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