CPAlead Campaigns

samedi 31 octobre 2009

Have Fun When You Promote Your Restaurant

By Jose L Riesco

You could be really creative when it comes to the different approaches to promote your restaurant and choose from several different campaign types to start off with. Whether you think about direct marketing, public relations or advertising always remember that you are fundamentally serving a need for people to mingle socially. This should be at the forefront of your mind when you are devising these campaigns and remember to have fun and enjoy it from your point of view as well.

You have undoubtedly got a good list of loyal customers already and you should turn to them to help you move forward. They will almost certainly agree to help you promote your restaurant if you just ask them and some ideas you could put forward include creating posts for you or "re-tweeting" on Twitter. Word-of-mouth is everything in the business and if you simply offer a free dessert or appetizers here and there, you are doing well.

You should go out of your way to get the e-mail address of your customer. This may mean that you have to give away something valuable, a two for one or something to entice them to give you the address. E-mail marketing is surely one of the best ways to promote your restaurant as once they have agreed to receive information from you this opens up a whole world of possibilities.

Once you're able to get information about potential clients and hopefully their birthdays, consider setting up what is known as an autoresponder system. This system is designed to send out e-mails in advance of special dates which you specify and in this case you might offer a free meal to the birthday person. Almost always they will come in to the restaurant with another group of people, anyway.

Theming is a great way to come up with some special gimmicks surrounding holidays, special occasions, religious days. By looking online you will find that there are such occasions available to you every week and you can link your restaurant through a menu item or some other kind of promotion to stir interest.

A PR campaign will promote your restaurant really well if you have something important to say. For example, you have just taken on a new famous chef or have a particularly tasty item available on the menu. Today, press release distribution is easy, highly cost-effective and will definitely bring you exposure if you do it well.

Consider how many local newspapers, radio stations or other media outlets you have in your location. Pick up a copy of the publication or tune into the radio station as appropriate. If you cannot see any evidence of a food critic or a restaurant expert, it is time for you to really promote your restaurant by getting in touch with the editor and offering your services for free. Take time to show him or her that you are an expert in your field and they will turn to you for any food related questions or news items that they have.

Social media is the buzzword these days and anyone who has a business should be involved. Promote your restaurant by creating a Facebook page in the name of your business. Start a blog and keep it maintained with regular menu items ideas, articles about types of food and so on. The secret here is to make sure the program is maintained regularly.

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Forex Traders: Free Publicity For Your Business That Will Increase Client Satisfaction

By James Scott

The process of gaining powerful publicity to increase brand awareness and client conversion rate while simultaneously increasing client satisfaction can easily be achieved in just a few steps.

First of all one must realize that publicity and marketing are actually the same thing because the former, if done properly, achieves both branding and client conversion. A business that is trying to raise awareness of a particular brand or product must first realize the cynical mindset of today's marketplace.

Before the reader can prompt a customer to purchase, you must first obtain legitimacy. Legitimacy can be created with online methods such as web commercial uploads to video hosting sites, helpful article submissions, social and news bookmarking that answers questions for potential customers as well as video and audio pod-casting.

These concepts should assist the potential customer by answering their questions and informing them of options as opposed to an ice cold sales pitch. By offering free information which will assist future customers with helpful, insider information will create a buzz about your company which will increase market share and sales conversion because you are proving that you are the powerhouse in the industry.

You are demonstrating to future clients that you are more concerned with guiding them through the tumultuous obstacles of making the buying decision based off of industry facts than a sales pitch. An informed client is the best client which will increase customer retention.

You will find that as you begin achieving sales via this new method, your clients are more informed therefore their expectations are positioned properly which leads to more client satisfaction.

Using this concept you'll never have to worry about the time consuming maintenance of having to satisfy the inappropriate demands of an uninformed client.

Be willing to freely inform potential clients seeking out your services before trying to sell them, you'll find that the sales process is more streamlined and your customer satisfaction will shoot through the roof. There is no other sales or branding method more powerful than this.

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Making Money Online With Mlm

By Bryan J Hooper

As the deep rooted recession continues, many people are out of work and are searching for opportunities and jobs. More and more individuals are turning to the internet for obvious reasons as there are countless opportunities and tremendous possibilities. Mlm is just one of the ways you can make money. Besides creating a residual income there are some other benefits you can get from internet MLM marketing these days.

Working for someone can be very annoying and frustrating. You are constantly taking orders from people and you have to to jobs that you don't want to do. When you enter into mlm marketing, it is up to you to decide the best way to promote your company, and you also have total control over the direction that you would like your company to go in.

The world wide web never sleeps, so you can work whatever hours you decide to work. If you are a night owl then you can work at night and sleep during the day if you choose to do so. I end up doing a little of both night and day hours. It all depends on what I feel like doing and when.

Having an online mlm career allows you to succeed from the comfort of your own home. This means that you no longer have to set your alarm clock, or get in your car and hassle with all the traffic when traveling to work. If you have made plans with your spouse or your kids, you don't need your bosses approval to meet up with them, after all you are the boss.

The mlm marketing business offers the possibilites of never ending opportunities. You will never have to worry about reaching the top and having no where else to go. You can continually expand your main company, or you can take on as many other opportunities as you like. I personally combine mlm and affiliate marketing. The sky is the limit when operating online.

Working on the internet gives people more freedom than they could have ever imagined. Whether you would like to pick up and move tomorrow, take a two week vacation, or take the time off, there is nothing stopping you from doing so. The freedom and independence that you will get from working online is amazing and so refreshing. and you go anywhere you desire to at your own discretion.

The mlm I am currently in offers everyone a fantastic opportunity. If you would like to check it out then simply visit my website. It is always wise to do some research on the type of mlm company you would like to join. No two are alike and they have many different products and pay scales.

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Designing An Exhibition Booth - Best Practices

By Valery Jones

One of the best marketing platforms for your products is a trade show that not only gives you an opportunity to register your presence but also enables you to draw customers. The design and management aspects of booths in the exhibitions should be meticulously planned as they have a huge role to play in pulling the customers to your booth.

The placement of exhibition booths is very crucial as understanding the layout of the entire exhibition grounds will help in devising proper exhibition designs. Moreover, your chosen booth must be durable and wide enough to shelter a good crowd.

The visual impression of the exhibition booth is also quite critical as it can draw visitors by projecting the company as well as its goods and services in an appealing and positive manner. Marketing specialists suggest that a person would not give more than three seconds to an exhibition booth and therefore, your booth has to be both visually attractive and appealing.

Hence the booth must have catchy messages that are impactful and readable from far away and a colour scheme with maximum two to three striking colours to make it stand out from rival booths. It is always a better idea to install an open booth instead of a closed one; but you must take care of the lighting arrangements in either case.

Another important element of successful exhibition designs is multimedia apparatus, which can get you a few valuable moments from the visitors. You can use audio, visual display or even interactive touch screen monitors for this purpose. Yet another way of drawing more visitors to your booth can be distributing free gifts to them or organizing a lucky draw with a grand prize.

Last but not the least, while making exhibition designs you must also remember your budget and this can be easily done by using collapsible displays for your stall. This will help you save money on your expenses by cutting down upon material and shipping costs.

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Industrial Design - A Key Part Of Business

By Johnny Bernabe

Industrial design is usually defined as the combined application of streams of art and science to enhance the function and aesthetics of a product and make it more desirable for customers. Industrial design can be applied before the introduction of a new commodity or for enhancement of an existing product.

The goal of industrial design is creating a favourable impression of the item. It is all about enhancing a product's value in the mind of the consumers and so they associate themselves with the product. This optimization is attained by adding new aspects to the product to make it more functional, and by improving its looks so that it becomes more attractive to consumers.

The first step in the direction of coming up with more attractive products is to conduct an elaborate market survey on the buying habits of customers. This should be followed by other features like sketching, sampling, and a thorough testing before the product is ready for promotion. Nowadays, there is a growing trend of making use of 3D software and CAD applications for making these tasks simpler.

The primary goal of industrial design is enhancement of the overall feel of the product. Designers have to concentrate upon a lot of factors other than the looks of the product. These include durability, functionality, ergonomics and the user friendliness of the product. In fact, a designer can even lower the production costs significantly by making required improvements in the design.

Industrial design is not limited to the above aspects but also extends to other factors like packaging, analysis of the market demand for the item, and also the study of the consumer's response to the product's design. Thus, industrial designers have to undergo a rigorous training for many years before working on a live project.

Some of the illustrious names in the profession are those of Brooks Stevens, credited with designing the Harley-Davidson motorcycle, Raymond Loewy, who rose to fame with the Coca-Cola bottle and Jonathan Ive, who has been known for the iMac.

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Steelers Continue Dominance Of Browns

By Ross Everett

The Pittsburgh Steelers have been playing the Cleveland Browns for longer than any other team in the National Football League, dating back to 1950. And while it hasn't been quite that long since the Cleveland Browns won a game against the Steelers it may be starting to feel like it. On Sunday, Pittsburgh won for the twelfth straight time dating back to 2003 as they topped Cleveland by a final score of 27-13. The defending Superbowl champions improved to 4-2 while the Browns fell to 1-5.

The good news for NFL betting enthusiasts who took the +13' with the Browns as a road underdog is that they managed to cover the pointspread by the slimmest of possible margins. Betting against the defending Superbowl champion is a long standing handicapping concept, and this season at least its worked like a charm-the Steelers have only covered one of their first six games. Cleveland, meanwhile, evened their NFL pointspread record at 3-3 on the season. The Browns have covered three straight after dropping their first three both straight up and against the spread. The 40 combined points went OVER the posted total of 37'. Pittsburgh has now gone OVER in four straight after starting the season with two UNDERs while the Browns evened their NFL totals mark at 3-3.

Pittsburgh dominated the game in virtually every statistical category. They amassed 28 first downs to 12 for Cleveland, held a 543 to 197 total yardage advantage and a 36:46 to 23:14 time of possession advantage. Both teams turned the ball over four times, and the Steelers led only 17-14 in the third quarter. Most of the post game talk from both sides was about a controversial spot in the first half where the Steelers were given a first down on a short yardage play when it appeared that they didn't make the required yardage.

After the contest, Derek Anderson spoke of the frustration of continually coming up short against the Steelers. The Browns have only one once in ten games since Pittsburgh moved into their new home at Heinz Field:

"We're not trying to lose every time we go out here. We put tons of hours in and ... it's frustrating. Every single week, it's frustrating."

Steelers' tight end Heath Miller said the team is happy to be where they are at this point despite not playing up to their standards:

"I think we haven't played our best ball yet and that's pretty comforting. We've gotten a few wins here without playing our best."

The Steelers will host Brett Favre and the 6-0 Minnesota Vikings next Sunday. After a bye week, the Steelers will hit the road to play another undefeated team as they take on the Denver Broncos on Monday, November 9. Cleveland will host the Green Bay Packers this Sunda. They'll head to 'The Windy City' to face the Chicago Bears the following Sunday and then have a bye week.

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vendredi 30 octobre 2009

Article Marketing Still Is One Of The Best Online Marketing Strategies

By John Farcikan

Article marketing still is making money online for many businesses, why is this and what can I do to get my share of this money?

If you want to promote your own internet home business, one of the most important things you have to have is a marketing strategy. In order for you to show good results on the bottom line and be successful, your marketing strategy should be as effective as possible, without costing the earth, and marketing can be expensive.

If you have already started a marketing campaign for your business article marketing is still able to work for you, and is one of the many tools you use in your overall strategy. Even if you don't write these yourself, paying someone to ghost write them will be effective to get targeted traffic to your business. So how do you do this?

This form of marketing is not actually a secret, it has been used, every since newsprint became mass media. It is a form of leveraging the media's ability to reach mass markets and it is extremely popular as a marketing tool.

Syndicated media sites attract a great many visitors, they want to reach what these sites have to say. But they need to provide people with fresh copy all the time. Visitors do not want to be reading the same material over and over again, they lose interest in the site. They in effect offer you a space for a soft cell and you supply them with interesting informative editorial, and they in return allow you to use a marketing resource box, which contains information about your business.

This is your marketing tool. The people who read your SEO article already have an interest in it, or they would not be reading about it. They find the article in relationship to a keyword search they have conducted online, and your resource box is back-linked to your website. This then becomes link bait for your products. If someone searches natural cures for acne, your article comes up and your resource box supplies a means to an end with regards the products, and your site receives targeted traffic.

You cannot afford not to receive targeted traffic, because no matter how much traffic your site receives, it is not good if they don't want your products. Conversion to sales is through article marketing is still does this more effectively than other marketing methods.

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Looking Into Strategic Management

By Bart Icles

Why do some corporate strategies succeed? And why do some of them fail? The answer is in effective strategic management. While most managers and executives are quite familiar with what strategic or institutional management is, many of them do not really have a good grasp of what this concept really means. And also, many of them fail to see that an understanding of strategic or institutional management should not only be kept within the managerial or executive level. This concept should be understood by all the people who are part of the company.

Strategic management is simply the formulation, implementation, and evaluation of cross-functional decisions and strategies that are aimed to help the company or organization achieve its long-term goals or objectives. It involves developing and specifying the mission, vision, objectives, policies, and plans of the company or organization. More often than not, these are expressed in terms of projects and programs designed to achieve the goals or objectives of the company or organization.

It also involves the proper allocation of resources so that the policies, plans, projects, and programs can be successfully implemented. In this manner, the mission, vision, and objectives that have been set can be fully realized. To help check whether the company or organization is on track, a balanced scorecard is often used. Through this balanced scorecard, the overall performance of the company or organization can be evaluated to check its progress towards the achievement of its goals or objectives.

While strategic management is meant to be a level of managerial activity, it also involves everyone in the company or organization. It involves the formulation of goals by thinking about doing more than just tactics. It helps give an overall direction to the company or organization. And more than just having a strategic alignment within the company, it also seeks to have a strategic alignment between the company or organization and its environment.

Simply put, strategic management is an ongoing process that seeks to evaluate and put control on the different businesses and industries that a company or organization might be involved in. It also helps evaluate competitors to help set specific goals and strategies so that existing and potential competition can be met or addressed. More importantly, it re-evaluates the each of the different corporate or organizational strategies regularly to help determine how it has been implemented, and whether the strategies have succeeded or they need to be replaced with new ones to better address different corporate or organizational and environmental changes.

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Thumb Drives Being Promotional Tools

By Eliza Maledevic

Custom created USB drives are 1 of the higher promotional tools accessible currently and will be included in any selling plan. These sorts of gifts have been in use for quite some time now and are regarded the most effective selling corporate gift inside the growing promotional product industry. These tiny gadgets are used the planet over and have taken over the floppy disc and compact disc storage segment. Most folks possess a thumb drive for the reason that of accelerating laptop ownership around the world.

Over the past few years, we tend to have seen companies using tee shirts and calculators as their main promotional items but nowadays this stuff have saturated the market, they are doing not hold the identical charm they did four or five years back. Computers and technology rule the planet and hence to firmly imprint the name of your business in prospective consumer's minds, you would like to go with something trendy, useful and appealing and a USB flash drive fits those criteria to a T.

A USB flash drive with 1 gigabyte memory is more and more than enough house to store promotional files, hyperlinks to websites and personal data. Moreover, they'll even be designed to boot automatically once the pen drive is inserted into the USB port by taking advantage of the terribly useful autorun programs. Most corporations store an electronic brochure of their company's beforehand.

Moreover, the company cloth that you put onto the pen drive will be set in such a means that the top user will not be in a position to delete it because of the write access settings, but he/she can be ready to work out the remaining area out there and use that house for their personal data. This makes certain they can use it for whatever purposes they deem fit while still have the opportunity to view the knowledge you put in anytime they have to work out it. Some common files firms place as preloaded content are hyperlinks and presentations.

After all, a USB flash drive is only 1 little section of the mammoth promotional products market. There are hundreds and lots of product you'll choose from. Some promotional gifts are daring and these are those visible on conferences and exhibition stands whereas the more delicate ones favor tee shirts and occasional mugs are given directly to the top user. Despite the growth of the many new and innovative promoting techniques and the growth of net marketing, the promotional product trade continues to grow by leaps and bounds since of the price it generates.

When shopping for a promotional gift Singapore, there are some things Singapore businesses must consider. For starters, you must recognize how you'd distribute your promotional gift. It should be given in an exceedingly approach that the consumer can remember it forever. A pleasant idea to form an enduring impression would be to pack it in an innovative and flashy approach that makes them believe they're getting a highly valuable and useful item for free. Once you know how you are visiting distribute it, begin the distribution method and you're done.

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Trophies and Plaques: Impressive Corporate Gifts

By Andy Harris

No business can ignore the idea of giving away corporate gifts. A corporate gift boosts the confidence of employees by recognizing their value, and thus helps in retaining them as they feel that they are getting the accolades they warrant from the organization. Employees are encouraged to outperform their peers when they see the incentive of being rewarded by the management. Given its immense importance, a corporate gift should be chosen after much thought.

A corporate gift ought to have some lasting worth associated to it so that the beneficiary can cherish it in the future. This is the reason why trophies and plaques have long been considered as great gift items, which always remind people of their success. Trophies and plaques inhabit a place in the receiver's showcase and form a positive impression on guests and other visitors.

Plaques have been one of the first options as gift articles for organizations globally since ages. They can be made of different materials such as wood, stone, and even synthetic plastics. But when it comes to popular preference and pure grace, nothing compares to a wooden plaque. Various kinds of wood, each having its unique feel, are used to create wooden plaques, but wood from oak or cedar trees are the popular choices.

During company anniversary or other ocassions, corporate achievement trophies and color sublimation plaques carved with your company logo are the best way to recognize staffs. They also make impressive corporate gifts. You can personalized them particularly for your company.

A glittering trophy given as a corporate gift, with the receiver's name imprinted on it, can have a lasting effect too. Trophies can be made of different metals and they are found in a wide range of styles. The dimensions of a trophy are contingent upon your budget, but do not go for a too small or a too large one.

Plaques and trophies are universally recognized as one of best corporate gift items for the permanent impression they develop, and they are always a safe choice.

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Special Jewelry For Sophisticated Women

By Barbara Soanes

Jewelry, since time began offers up a legion of the mythical and superstitious. Some stones have curative powers, others will ward off illness, offer protection, give bravery and will even attract the opposite sex. We have all felt at some time what our birth stone is and what it symbolizes. As there is only twelve months in the year this offers us only the possibility of twelve diverse gem stones. We are familiar with January being the Garnet, a cousin to the Ruby, February the Amethyst, March the Aquamarine, April the Diamond, May the Emerald, June the Pearl, July the Ruby, August the Peridot, September the Sapphire, October the Opal, November the Topaz and December the Turquoise. While this is all well and good there are more very fine stones out there that weren't lucky enough to be chosen as a stone of the month.

Malachite, Lapis Lazuli and Opal come to mind as do Onyx, Tiger eye and Jade. Totally worthy stones in their own right and if you would like to make one of them your own personal favorite, well who's going to stop you. The stone attributed to be your own just because you were born in that month may not be a color that you warm up to instinctively.

If you bechance to be a devotee of the more variety that Jade affords you over Emerald shall we say, then by all means select that. Jade is the bringer of repose, wisdom, long life and a peaceful death. Emerald imparts healing, success in business and to be able to fortell the future. Hmm. Tell the future? Bring those Emeralds on. Well perhaps not. Knowing the future may not be such a great thing after all, but you get my drift here.

The wearing of Malachite is supposed to be beneficial to the eyes and blood sugar levels. Lapis Lazuli is purported to make us more kind and helpful and is the stone of faithfulness. I once saw a open fireplace surround in King Ludwig's Castle Neuschwanstein in Bavaria made of Lapis. It was a bit extravagant but no doubt flamboyant in its luxury as non jewelry.

The primordial connection that Tiger Eye represents is as invoking as animal print silks. It has a luminosity that has a general attractiveness and is known as a custodial stone and treats eye disease. I guess the eyes have it. Naturally there's a lot more to gems, stones, silver and gold but for now we have scratched the surface and afforded ourselves the opportunity to delve a little further next time. For now, simply go out and look, touch and experience the wonder of the bauble and who knows, perhaps one will verbalize its own exceptional language to you.

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Blogging For Business Owners

By Damon Nelson



It doesn't matter if your company is small or huge, as long as you market well, you can make it happen. One internet tool that has been raking in good profits is blogging. With a single online post, you can reach thousands or even millions of people, and have your products and services heard.

Moreover, it promotes loyalty and boost the morale of your employees. Publishing your products and services online is an act that signifies your pride towards your company and employee. Hence, blogging boosts your workers confidence towards their job. If you have plans of taking your business to the next level, you are just on the right track.

Blogging for business owners has a lot in common with all other types of blogging, but it has its own unique pitfalls and strengths. The key to having a successful blog as a business owner is keeping your goals clear and concrete at every step of your blogging adventure. It can be all to easy to get sidetracked, especially if you are just learning about the exciting possibilities of blogging technology, but if you want your blog to succeed you need to stay focused.

To do this, list down your plans about your blog. Jot down all the topics you would like to talk about. Do research so your readers would have the confidence that what they are reading is actually useful. Then, plot the dates in your calendar so you'll be guided of the schedule of your publishing. Figure out if you will do a weekly or a monthly thing.



Another important aspect you have to focus would be the design of your blog. Make sure that the font style and size you've chosen is readable. Also, the color combination of your text and background should be reader-friendly. You have to ensure that your readers can actually read what you are saying.

Lastly, you must also take note of how you will promote your blog and gain unique visitors. Go and canvass for a paid ad if you want one. There is a free and effective method that seasoned bloggers know, that is getting help from your fellow bloggers to spread the word.

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jeudi 29 octobre 2009

How To Stars An Internet Business

By Elijah Rabadi

Even with the current economic state business is still growing and changing. Its making small changes in places we can't even see. Legitimate home business is also adapting and changing. Its niche in the business world is getting larger and larger and making a permit residence.

The more that people see your business or your name the more likely they will do business with you. This is because you will begin to establish a reputation that will speak for you and help make you more successful. You also want to find ways to build your resume, either by using freelance websites and providing services through them, or by providing testimonials from past clients if you are providing goods for sale. Anything that can let customers get to know you will help you out business-wise. Possible ways of advertising your internet business also include joining and being active on various social networking sites. There are also blogs, which are a form of online diary. Online diaries can be a very valuable marketing tool since you can easily tell your clients about new products, services or assorted information. You need to think about ways to build on different levels of your internet business. Think about different combinations of advertising methods. This allows you to direct traffic to your home website and increased popularity is always a good thing.

The common home business that most think of is a daycare center. Which for over the last two century's here the daycare center has proven to be a legitimate home business. It has given employment opportunities to thousands. Yet, there are so many home business jobs out there and growing every day. If you are looking for a new job, and happen to want to work at home. The field of options is wide open. You can go from a freelance writer to a telecommunications specialist or working with stained glass.

The next step would be to get a business license by registering your home based business name with your state government. This will help drive trust when traffic arrives at your site. They will be more confident that you are a legitimate business if you are licensed.

After you have planned your business and developed your website, you need to launch your company. Putting a website online is often termed "going live". Now, the only thing left to do is to get clients to visit your website. There are a few different ways to do this, and finding the most effective way to do so may take a little time. Because internet business is so different than regular business, the means of advertising are also very different.

Technology has been a huge change for small businesses over the years. When you can get your hands on a computer with the internet, that is half of what you need to start your own home business. It has made it so much easier then fifty years ago, even twenty years ago. And technology is still expanding.

In the United States the home business field is growing by the day. The US census has stated that in operation to date there could be around thirty eight million home businesses. That number is growing everyday. They are not just a flare or pop up either. For a period of three years Seventy percent of home business has not only survived but flourished.

There are different ways of advertising your business as well and some of these are very different than advertising a conventional business. You want to increase traffic to your site, so linking up with other sites and placing links to your company on those sites is an important way to get your name and your site out there and visible.

You cannot simply go into business online without a clear idea of what form you want your business to take. Do you want offer a professional service such as graphic design or consulting? Are you interested in starting a company which sells goods through wholesaling or drop shipping? These are critical considerations to keep in mind since a website to promote services will be very different than one which offers concrete goods to potential clients.

When you have made the decision of what it is you will be doing exactly, the product or service that you will be promoting, you need to design a website around that concept. You have to get the message out to the millions of internet shoppers. These people use the internet to actively look for information on products and services. To meet the demands of the shoppers, you need a website explaining why they should shop with you.

Whether you have decided to sell goods online or you want to provide a service, you need to know that while the internet can be a great way to do business, there are certain differences which make it different than a traditional office or store. Learning how to accommodate for these differences is the best way to ensure your business will be a success.

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UFC Ticket Sales Lag For Oregon Event

By Ross Everett

Portland, Oregon has long been considered a hotbed of mixed martial arts. The area is home to numerous MMA gyms, the most famous being Greshams Team Quest. It has produced many top notch professional fighters including Randy Couture, Matt Lindland, Ed Herman and Ryan Schultz. Regional MMA promotions like Lindlands SportFight and amateur MMA draws good crowds, and theres few markets in the country that have such a strong mainstream acceptance and understanding of mixed martial arts.

The UFC originally planned to hold an event in Portland last year, but when Randy Couture resigned with the promotion and agreed to fight Brock Lesnar UFC 91 was moved to Las Vegas MGM Grand Garden Arena. The UFC rescheduled their Rose City debut for August 29th, headlined by a matchup between local hero Couture and tough PRIDE vet Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira.

What they received instead was an outpouring of apathy from the community. As of early this week, there had been as few as 8,500 tickets sold in the 21,000 seat Rose Garden Arena. Even media sources like Yahoo Sports, who invariably put a positive spin on everything the UFC, does are reporting just over 10,000 tickets sold. In the final week runup to the event the UFC has been aggressively giving away tickets, so between that and walkup business theyll likely end up with a respectable 15,000 to 18,000 attendance figure. Itll look fine on the PPV, as they can curtain off unsold sections of seats and shoot the crowd to make it look larger.

Earlier in the week Zuffa announced the postponement of a WEC event scheduled for Youngstown, Ohio. The official reason given was an injury to main event fighter Ben Henderson, and while thats not been confirmed several sources have indicated that he did suffer a minor setback during training. Some suggest that the real reason was poor ticket sales.

While Youngstown could have been a bad choice for a MMA event all along, the UFC will probably blame the economy for the poor showing of live ticket sales in Portland. While the high unemployment rate nationally and regionally doesnt help things, it doesnt appear to be a major factor in the UFCs struggles to sell tickets in the Rose City. A number of local media outlets including the Portland based MMA website THE SAVAGE SCIENCE have talked to area UFC fans, and the results are surprising. A mind boggling number of people who self identify as casual or serious fans of the UFC had no idea that an event was being held in Portland at all. Thats likely due to a marketing and promotion campaign locally that is somewhere between misplaced and non-existent. The local media hasnt helped either, with Portlands largest newspaper providing little print coverage of UFC 102 claiming that its not a major sport.

Even among fans who *did* know that UFC 102 was coming to Portland, theres no buzz whatsoever. Theres a variety of reasons for this"many fans have suggested that the high ticket prices werent justified by a relatively weak card. With the exception of the main event, there arent any fighters on the UFC 102 card that are exactly household names outside of hardcore MMA circles. Others have suggested that they would be interested in attending the event, but theres a whole slew of competing events this weekend including the Oregon State Fair.

The UFC has a misguided notion that they can simply put their name on an arena marquee and local fans will pay top dollar for tickets regardless of who is fighting on the card or what else is going on that night. The reality has demonstrated otherwise with poor ticket sales in Portland and other markets. While the promotions PPV business is doing fine and is their real source of revenue, the weakness of the demand for their live product outside of a select number of markets should be a source of concern.

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Himfr.com Reports China Has Become The Largest Desktop LCD Market

By Amanda Xia

According to DisplaySearch, LCD panel shipments of desktop quarter and forecast report, in 2009 Q2 shipments of desktop LCD screen continued to rise nearly 6% to 4,050 million units, while China in 2009 Q2, as well as in the first half of 2009 to become Taiwan type machine LCD's biggest market.

However, DisplaySearch is still expected in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) in the second half of 2009 will restore the desktop the largest market for LCD screen, mainly because the peak season in Europe concentrated in the second half, and the economy gradually dies down. On the other hand, the presence of the Chinese market success of the IT market growth potential.

Unlike other regions, China's domestic sales of desktop LCD screen and desktop sales of closely related, because China's market over the past installed base of computers is low, so a smaller upgrade market. DisplaySearch believes that when the Chinese computer market more mature, companies and consumers will upgrade your computer to make a separate purchase of new desktop LCD screen.

On the other hand, the growth of the Chinese market also include government subsidies to stimulate, for example outside the large cities, when consumers purchase appliances can have like a 13% discount on home appliances to the countryside through similar benefits for the planned activities can stimulate the Chinese mainland The basic growth.

DisplaySearch Computer and Chris Connery, director of monitor research at the Public, said: "When the Chinese mainland to follow the world trend towards portable computer equipment in direction, the internal market is still positive developments in the desktop market, as against the same notebook computer, allowing independent sales Desktop Machine LCD screen in terms of market potential in the future. "He also said:" North America and Europe and other regions such as notebook computers and the Internet in this current market has more than desktops, its penetration has been as high as 60%. "

From the brands point of view, TPV (AOC) in 2009 Q2 to become China's largest domestic PC market, the desktop LCD screen brand owner, not only affect China's largest PC brands, Lenovo, and continues to Chinese DIY market continued strong growth.

AOC is a TPV of the major brands, while the TPV is the largest desktop LCD screen foundries, not only help to manufacture their own brands, but also to help the world's largest computer and desktop LCD brands such as HP, Acer, Lenovo and Dell and other manufacturers.

DisplaySearch expect China to 11 holidays can be continued strong sales of desktop computers screen. But the most important thing is, in any case, China's display industry has sufficient inventory to meet demand for 11 holidays. In addition, in the second quarter and third quarter, panel prices will limit the market to re-order inventory and shipments to China, and makes the global market in 2009 Q4 and 2010 challenges.

When the desktop to use LED backlighting LCD screen when they appeared in an issue between the costs and benefits. Some brands have been sold to use LED backlighting desktop LCD screen, the price is only CCFL backlight than using the same product only slightly higher, to the consumer and the company's flagship product of the concept of green technologies.

On the new platform, the desktop computer and LCD makers continue to develop new in-one machine (all-in-one, AIO) computer. When the number of new AIO computer is published in the first three quarters of this year are facing a situation of shortage of panels, many manufacturers can not be delivered on time and sell more newly developed low-cost products. As the panel supply gradually relaxed circumstances, many companies in 2010 for wide-screen computer AIO major investment plans and intends to focus for the Chinese domestic market.

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How To Make Money From Your Web Traffic

By Ron Cripps

Establishing your own E-commerce site is not like it once was since there are often millions of rival websites that all wish a share of the pie. Every plan and technique you can find to enhance the profits will be advantageous and though most of us are doing this for the money, it's common knowledge that without traffic there is no business. Like any business, if you don't have any customers you don't get profits.

Traffic represents all the people that have an opportunity to view what you have to offer, consequently the greater the number of people that look at your products the more individuals you'll have that wish to purchase them. Nobody puts up an E-commerce site that does not want profit and we all have a start up capital that must be regained. With steady traffic, we at least have a chance to accomplish that so monetizing your website traffic can increasing your chances of making the best from.

Making A Profit From Your Website Traffic

The best and most proven technique of making a return from your traffic is using advertising. The web creates tons of searches everyday and though a few individuals are simply seeking information there is also a fair chance people are looking for something that they require. But, creating traffic is not an easy task since you must compete with a large number of sites to create a good traffic stream. But, if this is done successfully this might open up a Pandora's Box of opportunities and one of those advantages is of course monetizing your traffic flow.Consequently, to more to the center of this, the more traffic you create the more likely you are make your website lucrative " essentially, traffic equates to money.

After you've achieved decent traffic you possess a decent amount of possible consumers who are willing to put money into your coffers. Other than that there's additionally traffic which may be diverted to sponsored hyperlinks which will pay you for a sizable portion of the visitors you have created. This plan is known as pay-per-click (PPC) and for each click a individual on your site makes on an advertised link, you will receive money. The more traffic you generate, the more clicks will occur and will create more net income.

Affiliate Marketing Programs

An additional technique for monetizing the traffic is by using an affiliate program. You can connect with other good websites or internet organizations and monetize the traffic through having a portion of the sales generated by traffic coming from your site. The basic idea is, traffic generated from your site will go to another website which may provide some product which you don't have yourself. Many programs can keep track and make archives of transactions which were possible due to website linking therefore when purchases are made by customers originally from your site you get a percentage of that sale. Affiliate programs provide you the advantage of monetizing the traffic and not having a real necessity of stocking or promoting a specific product.

There are so many ways and methods to monetize the traffic, all you require is a little bit of difficult effort and the desire to successfully start a money-generating business.

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The Mysterious Google Crawl - Part One

By Payo Hernandez

To many online business owners, the way Google conducts its indexing of the web through spiders and robots is quite a mysterious subject.

It's quite a complicated process but by educating yourself in the basics you can gain a solid understanding which will be useful when making some decisions about your website and online business.

The first thing to know is that Google performs 2 main kinds of crawls. A 'deep crawl' is where every page of your website is explored and indexed and this is kind of crawl through the net is performed about once a month. Because it takes so long to complete Google cannot rely alone on this kind of indexing, the internet is simply changing too fast and Google would quickly find itself out of date.

It takes about one week for Google to complete a Deep Crawl and then more time to finish indexing the information gathered. This is why it can take 6 weeks or more for a new site to be indexed by Google and if the domain and site is brand new it may not be indexed at all especially if there are no backlinks from other sites.

Due to this fact Google also performs a fresh crawl. Instead of indexing sites deeply it just grazes the surface of the web gathering latest updates and accessing home pages.

Fresh crawls are basically robots which follow links from one website to another and this is done much more frequently that deep crawls. Fresh crawls are what keep Google's search results up to date and current.

That's why you're far more likely to have a new site found faster through backlinks that by simply submitting a URL to Google and waiting for its deep crawl to index you.

It could take months as opposed to days with a few simple backlinks. Google keeps its fresh crawl schedules secret however by being alert it's still possible for you to recognize them.

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Environment-Friendly Corporate Gift: Non Woven Bags

By Dan Braddy

Any company, big or small, needs to market itself to get customers to buy its products. Many factors are taken into account while marketing, such as expenditure, extent of brand awareness created by the promotion tool, and even impact of the promotion strategy on the environment. A popular and effective way of marketing a business and its brands is by distributing gifts. Corporate gifts can be presented to both the company's staff and clients. It doesn't have to be costly, you just need to do a little research online and be inventive in choosing it. As corporate gifts, non woven bags are a very good choice. The best aspect of a non woven bag is that it is made of recyclable substance called polypropylene. The fabric is harmless for the environment and is completely non-toxic. People always like such products in the present times of environment awareness. Hence, non- woven bags have been a hit as a corporate gift.

Non-woven bags are made of environmental-friendly material. It is not only biodegradable, but also its the fabric that breathes, toughen, highly inflammable, long-life, re-usable, not easy twinkling, and cheaper than other material like nylon and woven.

Non woven bags come in a variety of styles and dimensions, and this makes them popular. Since non woven bags come in a variety of colours, all kinds of messages and logos can be printed on them. The polypropylene material that these bags are produced with makes printing on them both easy and inexpensive.

The non woven bags are so fashionable and colourful that people going out for shopping often like taking these bags with them. When people go out and carry these bags with them, they are in effect carrying an appealing mini billboard with them. Thus brand promotion happens immediately and free of cost. It becomes a smart marketing strategy that will drive sales and grow your business in a very creative and simple way.

These bags can either be presented as stand-alone gifts to prospective clients, or as containing other marketing objects inside them. Employees too can be presented a non woven bag, that they would be proud to carry it along, as it would be a symbol of the organization that they work for.

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mercredi 28 octobre 2009

How Click Fraud Can Hurt Your Online Business

By Ron Cripps

Pay Per Click or what is known as PPC is a method of online advertising that is utilized on web sites (like blogs for example) as well as search engines and advertising networks. Merchants put up ad content with a variety of such web hosts and the host is remunerated only if and when their ad is clicked. The words "pay per click" factually means what it says: the Merchant pays every time a visitor clicks on the ad.

Google, Yahoo! and all the additional PPC companies large and minor are now picking up millions or even billions of dollars in ad income based partly on the theory that clicks are a trustworthy, quantifiable gauge of consumer interest. But with so much cash up for grabs the PPC arena has not unsurprisingly appealed to armies of con artists whose actions have the ability to really erode consumer confidence.

Click fraud happens when a person, automated script, or computer software application imitates a legal consumer of a internet browser clicking on an ad for the objective of generating a charge per click without having real interest in the target product or service of the ad's link. Despite the fact that it is hard to watch and keep under control, a number of search engines have developed automated systems that endeavor to protect against these practices with varying degrees of effectiveness, but still the most highly developed of them are not infallible.

Further complicating the situation is the fact that the advertisers themselves benefit financially from such fraud. The biggest networks play 2 roles, as PPC providers and as publishers themselves (via their search engines), which can create conflicts of interest. For instance, whilst a PPC network will lose money to click fraud when it makes payment to a publisher, it more than makes up for it when it collects money from an advertiser, so indirectly, the PPC Network profits from click fraud.

Click fraud can be something as rudimentary as creating a trivial Web site, becoming a publisher of ads, and clicking on those ads to create revenue. Frequently the quantity of clicks and their worth is so insignificant that the fraud goes undetected. Larger-sized frauds entail running scripts which which try to make it look like a human clicking on advertisements featuring in web pages on a widespread scale.

Another source of click fraud is what are known as non-contracting parties, these parties are not part of any pay-per-click agreement.

Here are a few instances of non-contracting parties are:

Marketing competitors - By knowingly clicking on their competitors ads (by this means they are forcing them to pay for worthless clicks) they can weaken them or even put them out of business, even if they aren't profiting directly from this type of click fraud.

Publishing Competitors - Publishers may endeavor to frame their competitors by making it appear as if they are clicking on their own ads, with their end game being that the advertising network terminates their account.

Malice - Like the types of people who knowingly exploit and then email computer viruses, some will engage in click fraud not for financial benefit but simply to make a publisher or advertiser look bad for whatever reason.

Friendship - Sometimes when the friends and/or family of publishers find out that their friend's business makes money when their ads are clicked on, they may possibly elect to do this themselves, thinking that they are helping out. If they overdo it however, they can do more harm than good when the publisher is accused of being involved with click fraud and has their account closed.

While advertising networks make every effort to end fraud by all such parties it's often challenging to know which clicks are legitimate. More often than not the best an advertising network can do is to identify which clicks are most likely fraudulent and not charge the account of the advertiser.

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Affiliate Marketing: Highly Efficient, Highly Effective and Very Cost-Effective

By Greg Simon



The Internet has fast become an efficient and trusted way for companies to market and sell their product. One of the reasons for this has been the rise of "Affiliated Marketing" - which is when a website directs traffic to itself through adverts on other (usually related) websites.

There are different modes of payment for the affiliate. One scheme is known as pay-per-click scheme, where the affiliate gets a commission for every clicks the merchant's ad generates in his/her (affiliate) site. On the other hand, there is the Pay-Per-Sale system, wherein the affiliate gets his share of profits when the ad he/she posted made an actual sale or subscription. Generally, this Pay-Per-Sale or Cost-Per-Sale / CPS is the best scheme available for the affiliate and merchant alike.

Four years after the World Wide Web made its debut launch, is the same period that the Affiliate Marketing industry started. It's success was due to the CDNOW online purchasing system, which was followed by Amazon.com. Google also has a similar system which is mostly perceived as a part of Affiliated Marketing. With Adsense, they do not include the service of directly selling a specific product. They generate profits in other ways.



Since affiliate marketing is highly effective, highly efficient and cost-effective, it is a favorite choice amongst the merchants and affiliates. It has the capacity to generate huge profits for both the merchant and the affiliate without having to pay any fees. The only time a merchant and affiliate do a transaction is when a sale took place.

Merchants usually avoid Cost-Per-Click or Pay-Per-Click because of the frauds that I have mentioned above. Since in this system, merchants are forced to invest money without the guarantee of reeling-in sales. In effect, the merchants would rather use CPS or Cost Per Sale system, because it has no risk at all for both the merchant and affiliate.

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BOGO

By David Anttony

Definitions of some English words can change quite rapidly these days. In the recent past the meaning of words was often very fixed. Today the meaning can change in the blink of an eye. With faster and newer ways to exchange ideas such as Twitter and with wider and more culturally, socially and educationally dissimilar groups connecting together - words are put back on the anvil of evolution and changed into something new and more reflective of current life.

There's a significant global movement happening where consumers are asking business to take care of the things they care about such as the less fortunate in society and the environment. The request is mainly tacit and despite it being an ironic request it by far indicates still that we are in a time of vast change. Consumers these days want their cake and eat it. They not only want cheap products, they also want the environment to be preserved and they want workers to be well looked after.

There does not seem to be an answer to this conundrum and yet one does exist. It exists in the recoining or reforging of a single word. This word is a simple one - GET. Today, new movements of people who want to get but give at the same time are reforging it. It is being transformed into the word GIVE.

Every day I receive a notice from Google Alerts for two words - B1G1 and BOGO. It tells me all the new places that these words are being used on the Internet. I can now see that the new meaning of these words is coming alive 'poco a poco' [Italian: poco, little + a, by + poco, little].

B1G1 and BOGO, despite sounding like characters from a Marvel comic are acronyms for Buy One GET One free. You buy one and they give you an extra one for the same price.

If you look on Wikipedia you will find these definitions for BOGO (there isn't a definition yet for B1G1 - there will be soon when I write one!):

* An acronym in the retail industry that stands for Buy One Get One. For example, you could say "Buy 1 DVD, Get 1 FREE!

* An acronym in slang British that stands for Britons Of Greek Origin or Greek Britons.

* Bogo, Cebu, a city in central Philippines.

* Norway, a village in Norway.

* An alternate name for the Bilen ethnic group of Ethiopia or their language, Blin.

* The mascot of the ITESM CEM.

* BogoMips, an unscientific measurement of CPU speed

* Bogosort, an ineffective sorting algorithm

BOGO lights

There's an entrepreneurial business in the USA called SunLight Solar which was founded by Mark Bent. They've created a special torch that's not only an amazing and sturdy solar-powered light; his company also gives a free torch to that in need in developing countries every time one is sold. If you look up their website you will learn more about their "BOGO light".

BOGOlight.com. - "The BoGo - our Buy one/Give one - program has successfully provided lights to many, many thousands of people in the developing world, changing lives because of your purchase and participation."

Mark Bent has managed to flip the meaning of the BOGO acronym upside down. For Mark along with thousands of his customers, BOGO now means Buy One GIVE One. A light is given whenever one is sold. Now each sale supports people in remote parts of the world who don't have the benefit of electricity. They can now tap into solar power support themselves.

There are many other well known and less well know businesses now doing Buy One Give One giving or transaction based giving as it is becoming known. Some of the famous ones are One Laptop Per Child and TOMS Shoes. Some of the less well-known ones (in the USA at least) are based in Australia, New Zealand and the UK - Maple Muesli, Blinds Couture, Earthstar Publishing, Figure 8 Body Chains, Honestly Women magazine, Sunsplash Homes and Thavibu Gallery based in Thailand are just a few special businesses that are leading the Buy One Give One movement in their parts of the world.

Many Buy One Give One businesses are uniting under the common banner of Buy1GIVE1 run by a social enterprise based in Singapore. Buy1GIVE1 is the home of transaction-based giving. Any business based anywhere in the world can now start doing Buy One Give One giving with ease. It is becoming like a 'CSR plug-in' allowing a business to instantly start giving from each and every product or service sale, starting from just one cent. And it is no longer about giving an equivalent product to someone else; instead it is about contributing to a project that resonates with a company's activities. So for example a restaurant can feed a child, a TV manufacturer can give a cataract blind person the gift of sight (Get Vision-Give Vision), a magazine publisher can plant a tree for every subscription and a builder can build a low-cost family home for those in need (Buy1BUILD1) - the list is endless.

Something special is happening these days as more and more people are switching onto giving and 'citizen brands' as a part of their everyday experience. The 2008 Edelman Goodpurpose global study of consumer attitudes reveal that almost seven in 10 (68%) consumers would choose to remain loyal to a brand during a recession if it supports a good cause, and 71% say that when they think about the economic downturn, they have either given the same or more time and money to good causes. This very same study highlighted some other major things as well like:

* Half (52%) of consumers globally are more likely to recommend a brand to others when it supports a good charity cause over one that does not.

* and 54% would champion a brand to promote a product if there was a good cause behind it.

* And going even further globally, consumers are voicing a strong desire for marketers to connect their brands to social causes or action. Forty-two percent say that if two products or services are of the same quality and price, commitment to a social purpose trumps factors like design, innovation and brand loyalty when choosing one product brand over another.

Transforming Getting into Giving

The new concept of Buy One GIVE One is starting to replace Buy One GET One as the global giving movement led by Buy1GIVE1 ripples out. Right now if you search for the terms B1G1 and BOGO you will find that websites that do Buy1-Give1 giving are on the first page of Google results. Certainly with the large consumer demand shown for products from companies like TOMS Shoes, BOGO lights and OLPC - One Laptop Per Child, this tide is set to continue and spread.

I did a recent Google search to find the top 25 keywords associated with the keywords BOGO and B1G1. The results were interesting indeed seeing none of them contained the word Give. You can see the results below. It will be interested to repeat this experiment in 12 months time to see what changes. Consumers are now starting to drive significant change and despite them wanting to receive free gifts (as in traditional BOGO/B1G1), they equally want to help others and the environment. This feeling is validated by 2008's Goodpurpose global study.

Here are the results:

Free, photography, blogging, discount, networking, African, boots, groups, music, dallas, togo themes, wallpapers, buy, applications, skins, values, coupon, gift, sharing, shopping, pics, join, prose

Transactional or transaction based giving

Unlike normal charitable giving Buy One Give One giving is transactional. What is meant by that is: every time you buy something you give something. In the case of SunNight Solar they give a physical light for every light sold. In most cases, businesses that become part of this special form of transaction-based giving, give in a different way. At Buy1GIVE1, giving can start from just USD 1c contribution per sale. At this amount no business in the world can say they cannot give and 100% contributed goes to the cause.

The amount contributed from each sale is not the point of focus with Buy1GIVE1 transaction based giving. The focus is instead on the story and sharing the simple joy of giving. In the end, if you think that 1c is not a lot to contribute and is unlikely to make much of a difference think again and consider the following idea.

From its origins in Ethiopia, where the main coffee production is still from wild coffee tree forests, coffee consumption has spread throughout the world. Today Brazil is still by far the largest producer producing an average output of 28% of the world's total coffee. Brazil produced enough coffee in 2006 to make 216 billion four hundred million - 216 400 000 000 - espresso coffees. If we calculate that across global production then we get a daily global consumption of around 2,117,416,830 cups of coffee. The figures are hard to find but let's guess that 40% of the world's coffee is sold in coffee shops then we would get that 846,966,732 cups are sold commercially each day globally. This would equate to about 185,485,714 cups in the USA alone seeing they purchase around 21.9% of the world's coffee beans.

Imagine now that for every cup of coffee sold a child in a developing region like Africa received drinking water from its own well and it costing only one US cent per person per day. Now any coffee shop could afford to contribute this amount from the sale of a single cup of coffee because it has a high profit margin sale. Imagine the different that this alone would make in the world.

Transactional giving is the story of the thousand-mile journey starting with that first single step. Digging a well costs a few thousand dollars so it's a big barrier for communities in developing nations. However if you break the cost down it only takes the sale of a cup of coffee to give clean water to a single person for a day1. This is the power of transactional giving. It is like the compound interest of giving - a little turns into a lot very quickly.

Of course any company can do transaction-based giving with any of its products or services and do it on their own as some are like TESCO in the UK giving school uniforms to kids in Africa in partnership with Save the Children. And yet if companies choose to join together under a commonly recognised banner/brand they can have a powerful effect. The ripple that a single company creates is added to that of another and the ripple grows into a tidal wave of giving. This is the power of giving and doing things together.

Everyone wins with Buy One Give One transaction based giving. The consumer wins - at no extra cost to themselves they have made a difference through their purchasing choices. The business wins in so many ways. And of course the charity cause wins because they are now able to receive small amounts from numerous sources aggregated and paid in a lump sum by Buy1GIVE1.

A new start

If you go and check Wikipedia.com today for the word BOGO you should find that a new definition has been added. It's time for a tide-change - a change from focusing on GETTING to working with GIVING. I added this small addition to Wikipedia's BOGO definition: "... an acronym in the marketing industry that stands for Buy One GIVE One."

Imagine a world where every time you buy you are giving a gift forward to someone in greater need than you. This is the magic of transactional giving - seamless and simple.

This is the world I choose to be a part of.

And remember - you don't 'get' giving till you get giving.

References:

http://www.buy1-give1free.com/index.php/Partnering/Worthy-cause-charity-projects.html

http://www.buy1-give1free.com/index.php/Partnering/Worthy-cause-charity-projects.html

http://www.tesco.com/greenerliving/what_we_are_doing/ethical_clothing.page

http://www.tesco.com/greenerliving/what_we_are_doing/ethical_clothing.page

http://www.scfnw.org.uk/site/article183.html

http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffee

http://www.coffeepoet.com/2007/09/

Footnotes: 1 Calculated by taking the average cost to dig a well, dividing it by its average expected life without major maintenance divided by the number of people in the community benefiting from the well on a daily basis.

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Internet Marketing Strategies for Video Marketing and SEO

By Marcus Richard

Everyone knows that online video is the fastest growing online medium. As of Oct. 2008, not only is it popular, but on the major 5 search engines,video has now passed search as the most popular online activity, according to research released by comScore and covered by ReelSEO.

Online video, combined with search, is one of the most effective ways to drive internet users to your videos and market your products and services. However, being that online video marketing is such a new strategy, there are still many aspects of video marketing that are not well understood. For online marketers and video content producers, it is important to learn and practice techniques that increase the likelihood that internet users will discover their content via the major search engines. To do this, one must understand video search optimization, also known as video SEO.

To start off, let's answer the simple question, "What is Video SEO, or SEO for Video?" Basically, it is the process of creating and publishing a video such that it is easily discovered, indexed, and ranked by search engines. When we talk about video SEO, there are really 2 distinct strategies and methods to consider.

"Posted" video SEO is one strategy whereby the goal is to get as many viewers as possible to your video content. "Posted" video is basically when you optimize video content that is uploaded to video sharing websites. The benefit with this strategy is that you can leverage the massive viewing audiences that already exist at these major video destinations like Youtube and metacafe. Additionally, by uploading videos to these video sharing websites, you can leverage the pre-established page rank and authority that these sites have in order to assist you in ranking well within universal search.

When optimizing video for "Posted" video SEO, it is crucial that you pay close attention to the keywords that you choose to include in the upload fields like tags, descriptions, titles, etc... It is also recommended that you utilize many of the tools and services available that allow you to automatically upload your video content to many video sharing websites at once. The main downfall with "posted" video SEO is that it is more difficult to get users back to your own website property.

If your goal is to generate traffic back to your website, then you may want optimize video content on your own website. The strategy of optimizing video content on your own website is commonly referred to as "hosted" video SEO, or website video SEO. Because universal search is growing across the major search engines, an opportunity exists for website owners to leverage video content to rank well within both video search engines as well as the major search engines like Google and Yahoo.

To optimize video on your website, it is essential to follow common best practices when it some to general search engine optimization tactics for websites. Additionally, because search engines have a difficult time interpreting video content, you want to include relevant on-page text with your video pages to help search engines understand what the video is about. While there are many tips and techniques for website video SEO, the following tips are essential to keep in mind:

1) Make sure that the page with your video on it includes a good amount of relevant on-page text to guide the search engines. Include your keywords in your meta tags, URL string, descriptions, etc...

2) Consider publishing a transcript or captions for your video.

3) Keep your videos in one main directory with one video per unique URL.

4) Create and submit a video sitemap to guide the search engines to your video content.

5) Be sure to generate off-site links to your video pages by encouraging users to share and link to your videos.

Whether your strategy is to drive visits to your video or to your website in general, video SEO is an effective way to leverage the power of online video. If you are interested in learning more advanced tips and techniques for either "posted" or "hosted" video content, ReelSEO is the website to visit. They are the only site completely focused on providing resources and information for Video SEO.

Good luck and much success to you and your video optimization efforts.

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Need Assistance In Selecting Flowers? Here Are A Couple Of Tips

By Kathy Drilon

Gifting flowers to people on special events or to convey love or compassion towards close acquaintances has been a timeless tradition throughout the world. However, due caution and judgment should be exercised in choice of flowers, because they come in mind-boggling varieties and have been assigned certain meanings to fit certain occasions.

While choosing flowers, you have to strike a fine balance between what the recipient likes and what is appropriate for the event. For example, flowers with vibrant colours such as daisies or roses can be selected for happy events, as they are in keeping with the mood of such events. But unhappy occasions require you to show your sympathy by presenting flowers like white carnations or gladiolus.

Too much experimentation on your part regarding choice of flowers might not be fruitful if the receiver is not known to you too well, and in such a scenario it is advisable to go for conventional and safe choices. Here again, the occasion and the mood govern everything. For example, seasonal flowers are an excellent choice for a wedding and a cluster of lilies of various colours is great for someone's graduation.

Birthdays are generally a time for sending bold and brilliantly coloured flowers. For anniversaries, like 25 years, the most proper are luxurious and formal bouquets with a suitable color scheme. In celebration of giving birth, pink flowers are good choice for a baby girl, and yellow or orange flowers for a boy. The type of flower most suitable for all these occasions are gerberas, these are brilliant and bold flowers.

If you find yourself puzzled by the guidelines of gifting flowers or the sheer variety of the flowers themselves, then you can always look for professional help from a seasoned florist running a flower shop. A florist having an impressive variety of flowers and bouquets, and good credibility in the market or one who is associated with a renowned brand in the flower-selling industry should be able to give you the best value for money. If you are a resident of Singapore and are looking for good flowers, then this task would be quite easy. Most markets have a good Singapore flower shop, and the alternative of buying through the internet is also present for added convenience. To look for an online shop, all you are required to do is search for the words 'florist Singapore', and you will find a lot of options to choose from.

Online shops allow you to browse through virtual catalogues and offer more options than offline shops. But you must keep an eye on the extra charges imposed by online shops on home delivery of flowers, and how prompt it would be. You also have to guard against entering your credit card details on a dubious site that may lead to unauthorized access to your account. There are still many people who would prefer to do it the old-fashioned way and walk into a flower shop because of the precious advice of the florist, something which is usually not available in online shopping.

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Do Banner Ads Work? Can They Drive Traffic To Your Website

By Ron Cripps

When you are endeavoring to produce money off of the written articles on your website, it is critical to effectively promote your website so that you will attract in customers and they can see just what a good, quality site you have created about that niche. Banner advertising is merely one of many different varieties of marketing and web promotion methods.

Banner Ads Can Do A Great Deal For You.

Traffic from other sites can click on a banner that will take them to your business web site. While it can be a pricey exercise at first for you to promote yourself on websites that have a high volume of traffic, in the long run it can be more effective and less pricey than waiting for your page ranking to improve. Apart from paying to advertise on some other person's site, there are in addition free banner exchanges that you can choose from. We will look at the pros and cons of each banner advertising method below.

Free Banner Exchanges

When you decide to exchange banners with other people, you are using a free banner exchange. You place their banner on your site and they will place your banner on their site. There are 2 main problems with the free banner exchanges. First, if you want your banner on a significant number of web sites, it will mean cluttering up your own site up with these banners. This could even shot you in the foot if you run an affiliate Internet site because, rather than clicking on your affiliate links, your visitors might be clicking on your banner exchange links.

Following this, you need to pay care to the websites that you are switching links with. Some sites like to accumulate a lot of banners so that they can be a directory or portal site and not have to have any real substance. Another name for these sites is a link farm, and they do not supply any positives for your site, but they will taking advantage of your traffic.

Paid Banner Ads To Drive Traffic

As mentioned earlier, paid banner ads can be expensive upfront, but very positive if you use them the proper way. You are going to have to ensure that the websites place your banner where their people are going to see it and that they actually do have the traffic they claim they have. You in addition want to select a web site that does not put up too many other banners on the same page as yours or that there are no competitor links on the same page.

Altogether, banner ads can end up being profitable for you web site if you go about it the correct way. If you choose to use banner ads as a marketing venture make sure that you follow the tips we have listed above.

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mardi 27 octobre 2009

Self Storage Systems - Innovative Way Of Securing Your Important Items

By Edward Spencer

The self storage concept involves renting out segmented spaces of a huge warehouse to clients for any time span that suits them, no matter how short or long. Customers are enjoying better facilities provided by storage companies, as the companies compete with each other to fulfil the rapidly growing demand in the industry. Through greater use of technology, these firms have greatly increased the scope and efficacy of self storage.

The requirement for technology was realised by self storage firms basically in order to ensure better security of the items and to protect the goods from damage due to the conditions inside the storage. Later, technology was extended to storage and recovery of goods, and to increase the convenience for the clients.

You will find closed circuit cameras in any reputed self storage unit which ensures a safe storage of precious items. This system enables the storage managers and watchmen to constantly observe what is going on inside the warehouse and foil any attempts of theft in the beginning itself. Door alarms and electronic door access systems are also installed which makes it more difficult for burglars to move inside the premises.

For every individual storage unit, the customers are now given an access card in place of a mechanical lock and key system. In fact, some facilities even provide a biometric access system, which makes use of a hand scanner to open the door. Such security systems are best for the safekeeping of classified or highly valuable items.

Some facilities have now started making use of radio frequency technology to make sure of even greater security of your items. In this sophisticated system, an almost invisible RFID tag is put on each article kept inside the storage. Discovery of a tag by door scanners makes them raise an alarm the minute someone who is not authorized to move your items does so inside the warehouse.

Many people want to store valuable items made of wood or paper. Such items are very prone to damage if the weather conditions are adverse. Likewise, technological goods and medicinal drugs may get damaged due to exposure to excessive heat. Climate control technology is a perfect solution to this issue, and any good warehouse will have this technology installed to keep heat and moisture levels within safe limits for long term storage of your valuables.

There are a lot of other groundbreaking technologies being utilized by storage firms for better and safer storage, with their importance in the industry increasing rapidly. This is ensuring full protection and security of your valuable items at inexpensive costs.

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The True Story Of The Ali/Inoki Fight

By Ross Everett

Decades before mixed martial arts became popular in the United States, events matching fighters of different fighting disciplines were very common in Japan. They weren't called "mixed martial arts" at the time, but that's essentially what they were.There's an entire history of pro wrestlers fighting specialists from other martial arts (particularly judo) that were leaving out, but during the 1970's Antonio Inoki began to put the concept of "mixed martial arts" on the map with his matches against fighters from other disciplines.

Before and after his matchup against Muhammad Ali, Inoki would frequently compete against other martial artists in what are widely accepted to be "worked" (ie: having a predetermined outcome) matches. Inoki fought boxer Chuck Wepner, judo Gold Medalist Wilhelm Ruska and world karate champion Willie Williams among others. His most famous match internationally, however, was against Ali.

There's a great deal of uncertainty about many of the stories surrounding how the event came together and transpired, but a few facts are now known. Ali took the fight as it was a large and presumptively easy paycheck. The big money he was earning is what kept him from walking out when his camp started to disagree with Inoki's handlers over the rules and 'finish' fo the fight. Some suggest that it was supposed to be a fair fight going in, but Ali at the last minute insisted on rules more favorable to him. The more likely version of events is that Ali's handlers agreed to a predetermined finish, only to have Ali balk at the last moment.

The rules that were in place on fight night were so ridiculously one sided in favor of Ali that it almost defies belief. Inoki wasn't allowed to hit Ali with a closed fist, nor strike him in the head at all. He was also prohibited from using any sort of choke or submission maneuver. Most problematically, he was prohibited from trying to take Ali to the ground. In other words, Inoki was basically not permitted to do anything that would threaten Ali with any sort of physical harm.

The result was an absolutely horrible fight. Neither man showed much interest in engaging the other, with Inoki spending most of the time on the ground doing what he could under the one sided rules. Inoki threw kicks at Ali's legs, Ali threw an occasional jab and tried to protect himself from his opponent's leg strikes. The fight ended a 74-74 draw, with the real losers being the fans.

Some interesting trivia about the fight--the referee was former pro wrestler "Judo" Gene Labell, who is considered by many 'the baddest man on the planet' even in his 80's. He could have very likely beaten up both men at the same time--a spectacle that might have been welcomed by the live crowd and closed circuit audience worldwide.

After the fight, Inoki's popularity in Japan was greater than ever. He became something of a hero for trying to fight despite having the rules so decidedly in his opponent's favor. He'd continue his fights against other martial artists and remain one of the country's most popular sports figures for years to come. His 'worked' martial arts matches can be credited with sparking later hybrid promotions showcasing pro wrestling and martial arts that evolved into PRIDE, RINGS and the major Japanese fight promotions of today.

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