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Stop Scaring Your Customers - The Credit Transition
Many of you are in businesses where a customer’s credit history is an important piece in the qualifying process. The social security number is just as essential as the name on the application. But what do you say to increase the likelihood of receiving that increasingly important “444-55-7777”?After building a bridge of rapport with your customer, asking questions to dig for the true needs and hot buttons, and summarizing your understanding - you are ready to receive permission to look at their credit. Don’t even bother unless you have earned the right by completing the previous steps mentioned.Before we can go the next step in the sales process and propose any real solutions we have to see a credit history. This can be difficult because it often resembles a close situation. You may have to sell the customer on trusting you with their personal information. As always, look at this as an opportunity - a great way to measure how hot your customer really is. If they are just jerking your chain, you will definitely find out when you ask this scary, sales question:“Can I have permission to pull your credit?”Like most things in sales, if you make a big deal of it; so will the customer. Don’t use words like “pull your credit” or “check your credit”. These sound painful and invasive. I can’t tell you how many times I have listened to sales people prepare their customers for the absolute worst and set the table for a big, fat “NO!”.“Well…umm…the next thing I have to do is pull your credit history. But don’t worry it won’t hurt your score that bad. I mean nobody really knows how bad your score drops when you run a customer’s credit but we have to do it if you want to see if you’re approved. I’m really sorry…but can I have your social security number? ”What a loser. Imagine if you were trying to take a splinter out of your child’s hand. This is a fairly simple procedure that has little to no pain involved. However, if you were to tell your son or daughter “Brace yourself! This is going to really hurt!” You certa

n worries that have been dragging on the markets globally cannot curb what is on tap to happen. If companies like Citigroup (NYSE: C), JP Morgan (NYSE: JPM), Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS), Bear Sterns (NYSE: BSC), Lehman Brothers (NYSE: LEH) and UBS AG (NYSE: UBS) plan on competing in the future they have to solidify themselves as global players now so they can be well established for the future. This is beyond the financial industry, this holds true for retail, food, beverage, manufacturing and the automobile industry. General Motors (NYSE: GM) amidst their bumps in the road are growing nicely overseas, and believe it or not that is where the continued growth will be for a lot of industries. So investors should look deeper into global market conditions and take a good look at the companies that stand to benefit.

Movers and Shakers

Some major movers in yesterdays trading session included Hansen Natural (NASDAQ: HANS) this seems to be a main stay on WSMS but the stock continues to swing almost on a daily basis, it traded up $7.81 to close at $157.76 on Wednesday.

As the base metals saw some light yesterday so have the companies involved in the industry, Carpenter Technology (NYSE: CRS) rose $4.19 to close at $99.37, the

Promotional Marketing: Effective Logo Placement
I should have known better to say what I said, seeing how the caller was from an accounting firm. I merely suggested she put the firm’s logo on the back of a baseball cap. Her silence caused the sort of anticipation you experience when someone blows up a balloon until it pops. The words came slowly at first … finally she blurted, "You … you want to put my logo WHERE?!"Trying to regain control of the conversation I asked, "Claudia, why is your firm’s sign out front?"She replied, "What? Well, because that’s where everyone will see it.""Right. And if everyone could see your sign out back, you’d put it there too, right?" I asked."Of course," she replied."Well," I said. "When your employees are sitting in the stands at the baseball game, or standing in line for a hot dog or to use the restroom — everyone behind them will be looking at the back of their head. Would you like all those people to see your logo?""Hmmmmmmmmmmm."Placement of your logo on promotional marketing items, such as baseball hats, should be given as much thought as is given to selection of the item itself. For sake of this article, lets assume you’ve chosen an appropriate item for your event or promotion. And, your primary goal is to broaden your name I.D. Now, let’s give the same serious thought to logo placement. Consider the following: how will the product be used, where will it be used, venue, day or evening event, indoor or outdoor, will people be sitting or standing?With ball caps worn to a sporting event, most want to put the logo on the front. But if you want to maximize the advertising potential of a cap, put the logo on the back as well.Folding, portable chairs are another place people commonly misplace the logo. Why put the logo on the front of the chair, where it is covered up when the chair is in use? Better to put the logo on the backside of the chair where everyone behind the user can see your logo.What about pencils and pens? If you think about it, you’ll ensure that the imprint is as near the eraser end as possible. This way,

It’s Thursday June 15, 2006, and finally we had an up day, the market showed some strength pretty much for the entire trading session, granted it was modest but definitely a welcome sight. The Nasdaq avoided making history by being down for a ninth day in a row and the S&P 500 broke that 7-month slide.

Yesterday morning the Labor Department reported that the May Consumer Price Index aka the CPI rose 0.4 percent, after a 0.6 percent rise in April. This is beyond the comfort level of the inflation fighting Fed. These latest numbers are pretty much an indication that the Fed will raise interest rates on June 29, 2006. So we may have to prepare ourselves for another bump up in August but lets not get too ahead of ourselves just yet.

Political Front

It looks like Iran’s master plan may be coming to light as Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stated that he wants to increase cooperation with a central Asian security group that includes China and Russia and that the region needs a solid wall against any outside interference. This was said at the S'hanghai Cooperation Organization Summit, which consisted of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. China has publicly said that they will not be a member of the group, that is the story today anyway, as we know tomorrow always brings another element into the mix.

Now sticking to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit or the SCO Summit, Russia's president Vladimir Putin made a proposal while he spoke at the SCO, he proposed the creation of an energy club within the SCO and mentioned that Russia could actually finance some economic projects pursued by the six-nation regional forum. And the plot thickens.

President Bush spoke on Wednesday, this comes on the heels of a surprise visit that he made to Baghdad. He looked confident as he stated that he senses something very different happening in Iraq. He predicted that the progress in the region will be steady and he looks for the violence to subside.

The Bank of Japan’s Governor Toshihiko Fukui issued a public apology to the Japanese parliament on Thursday as it related to an investment that he made in a fund run by an ex-bureaucrat arrested for suspected insider trading, he said he would not keep any profit. He invested approximately $87,000 back in 1999 and held it since then, so this was not a recent investment and was prior to the arrest of the high profile fund manager Yoshiaki Murakami.

Tid Bits

Boeing (NYSE: BA) should be the recipient or better yet the beneficiary of the recent slide of Airbus. The credibility of EADS, who is the majority owner of Airbus, was questioned after the company reported substantial delays of their A380 super jumbo planes. This just sliced over 30% of the company’s stock value off the top. Now keep in mind that these delays may be contract breakers and Boeing could begin to receive a slew of orders for their latest plane that was created to compete with Airbus. The street liked what they heard and that pushed Boeing up $5.03 as it closed at $82.01 on Wednesday.

Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) is not taking any prisoners on this one, they have raised their offer for largest port operator, Associated British Ports Plc, by 3.7% or US$4.76 billion (2.58 billion pounds). This is in an effort to trump a potential offer from Macquarie Bank Ltd. The acquisition of this company puts Goldman Sachs in an interesting position as they could now be granted U.S. port deals with ease. A recommendation from the new Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson doesn’t hurt their cause either.

Crude oil futures got a boost yesterday on the heels of a report from the United States that showed US crude stocks suffered a larger-than-expected fall as US refineries boosted production rates to meet peak summer fuel demand. So we may see follow through today.

As we mentioned on Wednesday, precious and base metals seems to have come close to hitting a bottom, but we need follow through before we can be sure of that. Gold, Silver, Copper and other metals rose yesterday and could possibly rise today as the demand is coming into play once again. The precious metals are potentially closer to a bottom than the base metals so be aware of that going in. Of course this trickle down to the metals stocks, companies like Rio Tinto (NYSE: RTP), BHP Billiton (NYSE: BHP), Crystallex International (AMEX: KRY), Phelps Dodge (NYSE: PD) Newmont Mining (NYSE: NEM), Peru Copper (AMEX: CUP) and Bema Gold (AMEX: BGO) should move higher as the metals begin to rebound. So lets look at this carefully today and going into the weekend.

Lehman Brothers (NYSE: LEH) is looking to make a slash in Asia, as they are prepared to invest US$20 to $30 million in Shenzhen Development Bank, which is one of only five banks listed in China. As we have been speaking about on “Wall Street to Main Street” the expansion in both China and India will continue because the market is so great. The inflation worries that have been dragging on the markets globally cannot curb what is on tap to happen. If companies like Citigroup (NYSE: C), JP Morgan (NYSE: JPM), Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS), Bear Sterns (NYSE: BSC), Lehman Brothers (NYSE: LEH) and UBS AG (NYSE: UBS) plan on competing in the future they have to solidify themselves as global players now so they can be well established for the future. This is beyond the financial industry, this holds true for retail, food, beverage, manufacturing and the automobile industry. General Motors (NYSE: GM) amidst their bumps in the road are growing nicely overseas, and believe it or not that is where the continued growth will be for a lot of industries. So investors should look deeper into global market conditions and take a good look at the companies that stand to benefit.

Movers and Shakers

As the base metals saw some light yesterday so have the companies involved in the industry, Carpenter Technology (NYSE: CRS) rose $4.19 to close at $99.37, the s

Important Things to Know About Divorce and Credit
Joint debts remain joint debts.Both spouses signed a legally binding contract with the creditor, and a divorce decree neither amends this contract nor relieves the creditor's investment in you. Amendment of any contract requires agreement by all parties, including the creditor, and proof of the amendment requires the signature of all parties. During a divorce, the creditors are not part of the divorce courts, and therefore the original agreements/contracts stand. If you have a joint financial obligation with your ex-spouse, and your divorce decree states that your ex-spouse is responsible, and your ex-spouse is delinquent on paying, your credit as well as his/hers is affected. As is stated above, your legal responsibility for a debt does not go away because a divorce decree assigns responsibility for a debt to your ex-spouse. Along with a legal responsibility to pay comes the right of the creditor to report a debt delinquent on your credit report if it's not paid as agreed in the original contract. Especially tragic are situations where one ex-spouse files bankruptcy and includes many joint debts in the bankruptcy. The spouse not filing bankruptcy is left holding the bag for these joint debts, and many times they're not notified of the ex-spouse's filing until months or years down the road when it's too late to correct the situation. So not only is the spouse who didn't file responsible for the unpaid debts and can be legally sued for them, but the non-filing bankruptcy spouse's credit is also ruined, something that cannot be corrected, as the credit bureaus have the right to report them delinquent. The purpose of divorce is to split off emotionally and financially from your ex-spouse. If you aren't careful, your spouse's handling of your once-joint accounts can haunt for years. If you had joint debts which existed before your divorce, and these accounts are not both paid off and closed, you're just asking for trouble. Also, although some divorcing couples are definitely out to get each other, most problems with joint accounts prior to

roup, that is the story today anyway, as we know tomorrow always brings another element into the mix.

Tid Bits

Movers and Shakers

As the base metals saw some light yesterday so have the companies involved in the industry, Carpenter Technology (NYSE: CRS) rose $4.19 to close at $99.37, the

The Difference Between 'Work At Home' Scams And Legitimate Opportunities
Everyone is aware of scams all over the Internet. In fact, many have become so sceptical that they turn away any money-making opportunity they come across. Without a doubt, these scams are given real businesses and the online marketing community in general a bad name.Go to a job site or a classified section, search for 'data entry' and you will see some home typing jobs and data entry at home opportunities. Are these real?Let me tell you straight off - they are not!Once you send in your resume (as if it was needed) to these opportunities, they will reply you with a link to their website. Usually, these are websites that are done unprofessionally, unformatted, and point you to various links to home job sites which ask you to pay a fee.Why do they this? Because when you pay a fee, these people get paid a commission! And the data entry jobs from home might not even be legitimate. For one, when do you ever need to invest money to type data entry at home! That is the easiest sign of a scam!Yet, many people believe in that working from home means typing stuff at home. Well that is true, if you are employed by a company, and your boss says it is more cost-effective and efficient for you to work at home. Other than that, you can do telemarketing.If you want to make money at home, on your terms, the only way is to start a home business. A legitimate one.

SE: BA) should be the recipient or better yet the beneficiary of the recent slide of Airbus. The credibility of EADS, who is the majority owner of Airbus, was questioned after the company reported substantial delays of their A380 super jumbo planes. This just sliced over 30% of the company’s stock value off the top. Now keep in mind that these delays may be contract breakers and Boeing could begin to receive a slew of orders for their latest plane that was created to compete with Airbus. The street liked what they heard and that pushed Boeing up $5.03 as it closed at $82.01 on Wednesday.

Movers and Shakers

As the base metals saw some light yesterday so have the companies involved in the industry, Carpenter Technology (NYSE: CRS) rose $4.19 to close at $99.37, the

3 Fastest Ways To Get Traffic To Any Website
After all the debate over website design, shopping carts and credit card processors, every website owner eventually comes to the startling realization that they need one more thing to survive - website traffic!Without website traffic it's the same as building an expensive billboard and, instead of placing it alongside a busy highway, hiding it in your *basement* where nobody can see it.Upon realizing they need traffic, most website owners run out and start blowing chunks of money and time trying to get "hits," but they fail to grasp that there are really only three (3) reliable ways to get traffic to any website.Method #1 - Buy Traffic Currently, the fastest way to get traffic to any website involves using the little classified ads on the right side of search giant Google's results pages.Called Google AdWords, the system allows any advertiser to open an account with a $5 activation fee and start seeing their ads appear on Google within about 15 minutes.Advertisers only pay when visitors actually click through from their ad on Google to their website or affiliate link.Overture.com also sells traffic by the click, but they make you wait three to five days to go through their editorial review process before allowing ads to appear on their network.You can also buy advertising on dozens of other pay-per-click search engines.They all follow the same basic model of only charging advertisers for targeted visitors who read an ad based on a keyword search and decide to click through for more information.Log on to www.payperclicksearchengines.com for a list of over 600 choices ranked by market penetration.A word to the wise on pay-per-click advertising: Watch your costs and track and measure everything. Even though you can get traffic for as little as a penny, you should track your results by search engine and by individual keyword if you want maximum success.Many a company has lost its entire adv

ected fall as US refineries boosted production rates to meet peak summer fuel demand. So we may see follow through today.

Movers and Shakers

As the base metals saw some light yesterday so have the companies involved in the industry, Carpenter Technology (NYSE: CRS) rose $4.19 to close at $99.37, the

Strong Leadership Builds on a Bedrock of Strong Values
"Values are the bedrock of any corporate culture. As the essence of a company's philosophy for achieving success, values provide a sense of common direction for all employees and guidelines for day-to-day behavior...often companies succeed because their employees can identify, embrace, and act on the values of the organization." — Terrence Deal and Allan Kennedy, Corporate Cultures: The Rites and Rituals of Corporate LifeEarly in my career I found work that was a great fit for my skills and interests. I grew and moved through the company to ever-higher levels of responsibility. I was especially lucky to be mentored by a senior manager who coached and developed my skills, and brought out more potential in me than I realized I had at the time. Her trust and faith in me built my confidence and a strong foundation for future growth.After one promotion that would take me across the country to manage the company's largest branch, I spent a week introducing John, the new president (he was also new to me, since he came from another part of the company), to the various field managers I served and supported with my internal training and consulting work.It quickly became embarrassing to be with him. He was an obnoxious boor who had all the answers – often to questions he wasn't even asked. His personal time management was a joke. One morning, at the time we were to leave for a meeting, I had to rouse him from bed by pounding on his hotel room door (he'd been "out on the town" the night before). His honesty and ethics were questionable,...and he was an elitist who treated front line team members as "the little people."I subsequently moved 2,000 miles away from him and head office to assume new responsibilities at one of our branch offices. Since he was clearly an out-of-sight-out-of-mind manager I was thankful for the distance that separated us. But since I did report to him, I was still obliged to maintain contact through periodic phone conversations and occasional meetings.During one of those meetings, some 12 months after moving from head office, we

Movers and Shakers

As the base metals saw some light yesterday so have the companies involved in the industry, Carpenter Technology (NYSE: CRS) rose $4.19 to close at $99.37, the stock has fallen from their May 2006 high of $142.11. Keep in mind that prior to the spike in base metals the stock was hanging in the $60 range, as we said precious metals seem to have hit a relative bottom, more so than base metals.

In a move that will put certain issues to bed for both German companies, Bayer (NYSE: BAY) and Merck (NYSE: MRK) have come to terms and Bayer will pay Merck US$4.6 billion for its share of Schering, a move that clears the way for Bayer to acquire Schering. This was good news for the street as Bayer rose $3.07 to close at $41.28 on Wednesday/

After slipping from the $72 range in May 2006 and closing as low as $56.86 in June, Nutrisystem, Inc (NASDAQ: NTRI) on the heels of bump up from Lazard Capital, rose $$2.84 to close at $59.70. The stock shot up in April from the mid $40 range to its 52 week high of $76.33 on a positive quarter and the launch of a marketing campaigned geared towards males. Now this quarter will tell the story of Nutrisystem and show whether this campaign met the expectations of not only the company but of the street.

Other stocks that made nice moves on Wednesday include Casey’s General Stores (NASDAQ: CASY) traded up $4.04 to close at $24.83, PetroChina (NYSE: PTR) traded up $3.84 to close at $94.47, Oil Services HOLDR’s (NYSE: OIH) traded up $3.57 to close at $135.67, Monster Worldwide (NASDAQ: MNST) traded up $3.36 to close at $38.94, Kookmin Bank (NYSE: KB) traded up $3.45 to close at $76.65 and SouthWestern Energy (NYSE: SWN) traded up $3.25 to close at $28.05 on Wednesday.

Under Ten

Other stocks that made moves on the upside under ten bucks include Gold Reserve Inc (AMEX: GRZ), the stock moved up as the precious metals started to rise, if this should continue they are one of a few companies that stand to make nice movement. Gold Reserve traded up 84 cents to close at $4.80 on Wednesday. Other stocks to look at under ten bucks that stand to benefit for the bounce include Silver Wheaton (NYSE: SLW), Crytallex International (AMEX: KRY) and Bema Gold (AMEX: BGO).

Taser International (NASDAQ: TASR) made some movement on the upside as its Chairman Phillips W. Smith bought $762,000 worth of the company's stock. This usually gives a boost to the level of investor confidence in the stock. Even though that pushed the stock to close up 55 cents at $$8.02, you have to understand that back in December of 2004 this was a $31 stock. Now I haven’t had the opportunity to look deep into the company so I am not aware if it split or not while it was at its highs, but from my initial look, it doesn’t seem so. So proceed with caution on this one.

Chinese telephone maker Qiao Xing Universal Telephone Inc. (NASDAQ: XING) moved higher yesterday even after they raised US$40 million in a convertible bond offering. The company made some bold statements ahead of the release of their 2005 earnings on June 20, 2006,. The company stated that the their 2005 basic earnings per share, before one-time gains, will "increase significantly" to well above $1, that is compared to 17 cents per share in 2004. Now that is a bold statement but what are those one-time gains?, this one is tricky as the company touting their earnings prior to the earnings announcement scheduled to be release in a few days just raises a red flag for me, but I could be wrong. The stock traded up 55 cents to close at $8.02 on Wednesday.

Other stocks that moved higher yesterday under ten bucks included Emcore Corp (NASDAQ: EMKR) which traded up 84 cents to close at $8.69, Internet Initiative Japan (NASDAQ: IIJI) traded up 50 cents to close at $6.99, Sunopta ((NASDAQ: STKL) traded up 45 cents to close at $7.92, Anadigics (NASDAQ: ANAD) traded up 44 cents to close at $6.64 and Arm Holdings (NASDAQ: ARMHY) traded up 42 cents to close at $6.18.

Downers

Some stocks that traded down yesterday included OYO Geospace (NASDAQ: OYOG) which traded down $6.74 to close at $47.50, Teleflex (NYSE: TFX) traded down $4.66 to close at $53.38, OptionsXpress (NASDAQ: OXPS) traded down $3.81 to close at $22.23, Regional Bank Holders (NYSE: RKH) traded down $2.08 to close at $143.55, Pegasus Wireless (NASDAQ: PGWC) traded down $1.97 to close at $6.70, Apollo Group (NASDAQ: APOL) traded down $1.73 to close at $52.61 and Sunrise Senior Living (NYSE: SRZ) which trade down $1.62 to close at $28.80.

Now some stocks under ten bucks that received the royal smack down yesterday include Terremark Worldwide (AMEX: TWW) drops like a rock on a wider quarterly loss. The stock traded down $2.42 to close at $3.69,of course the downgrades didn’t help the situation but this is a big drop and could flag a ton of margin calls if it has not already. So this drop could continue today.

Now this is a recent IPO that has fallen from its IPO price, Basin Water (NASDAQ: BWTR) sells systems for the treatment of contaminated groundwater, which is their line of business. The stock opened at $15.70 when it c

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