Issue #2542
- WEALTHY: Stocks are people, too (Rick Pendergraft)
- HEALTHY: Boost your immune system with a tap (Kelley Herring)
- WISE: Solomon Short on being smart
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
- Is it time to fire your CEO? (Clayton Makepeace)
- Hungarian pastry, blackberry brandy, and Trivial Pursuit (Melanie Segala)
- It’s Fun to Know… about frankincense and myrrh
- Add “chauvinist” to your vocabulary
== Highly Recommended ==
It Is a Great Time to Start a Business… And Let Me Tell You Why
Can’t think of worst time to start a business than today? Well, consider this…
- William Hewlett and David Packard founded Hewlett-Packard in 1939, while the Great Depression had been underway for a full decade…
- In September 1945, Masaru Ibuka started Sony after his country had been devastated by war and was occupied by a foreign power…
You see, a business start up can not only survive, but thrive in times of economic crisis.
YOU can do the same. And thanks to the Internet your journey to a bright financial future will be a lot easier – and faster – than Sony’s or Hewlett-Packard’s. You can be making $100,000 to $25 million a year in no time with your own business with our proven strategies and coaching.
What Is an Eeyore Stock? (and How Can You Make Money on One?)
Believe it or not, stocks have personalities.
They can be happy, sad/depressed, manic, or plodding. Happy stocks go up almost every day, regardless of market conditions. Sad or depressed stocks go down almost every day, regardless of market conditions. Manic stocks? We could call these “Jim Cramer” stocks, because they are as volatile as the CNBC commentator. They bounce wildly from day to day. And we could call plodding stocks “Eeyore” stocks. They slog along without drawing any attention, just hoping someone will notice them. For the most part, these stocks grind sideways.
Knowing the personality of a stock will determine how you want to trade it. You want to own happy stocks… short depressed stocks… buy options on the manic stocks… and sell options against the plodding ones.
[Ed. Note: The market may be volatile, but it still offers plenty of ways to profit. Knowing the personalities of the stocks you control could keep you ready to tackle opportunities as soon as they present themselves. Market analyst Rick Pendergraft has put together an educational program that lays out the simple steps you need to take advantage of these chances to prosper. Not only do you get three months of Rick's best recommendations, you also learn how to make good investment choices yourself. Get the details here.]
“Half of being smart is knowing what you’re dumb at.”
Solomon Short
How to Kill a Great Company in One Easy Lesson
Back in the 1980s, I agreed to help the owner of a small company grow his business. Within three years, it was the largest company in its industry.
By combining five key marketing strategies with kick-butt sales copy, we were attracting between 5,000 and 10,000 new customers every month. By 1988, we had more than 120,000 paying customers. Sales revenues and profits quadrupled.
At that point, my client decided to cash out – take his profits and retire – and asked me to help him sell his company. I created a 20-minute video and a comprehensive “company profile” to help attract prospective buyers.
The buyers – who paid top-dollar – turned out to be a team of three Rhodes Scholars with advanced business degrees from Oxford University.
Within a week after the papers were signed, the crackerjack marketing team we had built was placed under an oppressive bureaucracy: an “Executive Committee” made up of the new owners, their handpicked CEO, the CFO, and the General Manager – none of whom knew one blessed thing about marketing.
In days, the company went from being obsessed with marketing to being infatuated with something called “Corporate Planning.” Key marketers were sidetracked in day-long meetings – and, sometimes, week-long out-of-the-office marathons. Scores of crucial sales promotions were put on hold while the marketing staff diddled themselves silly with endless research and reporting tasks.
I, of course, went ballistic. I warned everyone who’d listen (at the top of my lungs) that de-emphasizing marketing was going to drive the company into bankruptcy.
That drew giggles all around.
“You’re overreacting,” said the new owners. “It’s going to be just fine,” chanted the Executive Committee.
It wasn’t fine. Not by a long shot.
The flow of new customers faltered, then plunged. Our active customer file began shrinking. Sales to existing customers plummeted.
Finally, unable to make the new owners see the error of their ways, I fired the client. As I walked out of the office for the last time, I told the CEO, “Now I understand what being a Rhodes Scholar does for you. You’d have to STUDY to be this stupid.”
I told the CEO that his company would be belly-up within six months. I was wrong. He filed for bankruptcy 90 days later.
Moral: Smart Companies put marketing first.
Okay, I admit it: I’m a marketing chauvinist. And it’s not because I think we’re necessarily smarter and better looking than everyone else. It’s because the only logical place for marketing is out front – leading the charge for your entire company.
It drives me nuts when executives who know nothing about sales and marketing mindlessly parrot phrases about “putting the customer first” – and then relegate the only people who actually talk to customers to an inferior position in the company.
Before the Rhodes Scholars showed up, my client had put sales and marketing first. And because the job of the Marketing Department was to respond to customers’ desires and concerns… it meant our customers were #1.
But the Rhodes Scholars and their preening “Executive Committee” wanted to be first – the masters of all they surveyed, at the pinnacle of the corporate pyramid. So they put sales and marketing in its place – under their thumbs, no more important than janitorial services.
And by doing so, they turned my client’s “Smart Company” into a dumb one in one fell swoop.
In a Smart Company, the Marketing Department exists at the top of the corporate pyramid.
Armed with the freshest intelligence on the desires and complaints of prospects and customers, the Marketing Department directs…
- The development of new products and the production of existing ones…
- The scripting of the sales force or telephone customer service reps…
- The creation of sales promotions and the layout of the catalog and/or store…
- The shipment of products and the delivery of services…
- The management of the Customer Service Department, and…
- Every other activity in the chain of events that begins with contacting a prospect or customer and culminates with the cha-ching of the cash register.
In Dumb Companies, top execs fail to understand the supreme importance of sales and marketing – or, worse, they see it as a “necessary evil.”
And their structure shows it. Marketers are kept under tight rein – slaves to multiple layers of bean counters, bureaucrats, and other self-important gasbags who have long forgotten where the money in their paychecks comes from – if they ever knew in the first place.
Even worse: Dumb Companies make sure that marketers – the only experts in the company capable of boosting sales, revenues, and profits – are frozen into inaction and that crucial sales campaigns are delayed by corporate procedures requiring marketing-challenged morons at the top to approve their every move.
The CEO and top execs spend no more time or effort on sales and marketing than they do monitoring Human Resources, or any other department. Marketing is beneath them. Something the weirdoes down on the fourth floor are responsible for.
In a Smart Company, every employee clearly understands that his/her job exists for one reason and one reason only: to help marketing sell more, more, more!
• Accounting exists to ensure that the Marketing Department has the financial resources it needs to attract maximum numbers of new customers and to boost sales revenues.
• Human Resources exists to ensure that the Marketing Department has the best talent available and that supporting departments have what they need to help the department be more successful.
• Information Technology (IT) exists to give the Marketing Department the daily reports it needs to monitor and analyze the effectiveness of its strategies and tactics.
• The Legal Department exists to help marketers create promotions that are as effective as is humanly possible within established ethical and legal boundaries.
In a Smart Company, the business owner/CEO occupies not one, but two positions:
1. Leading the charge with the Marketing Department – setting goals… monitoring key costs and response rates… helping them innovate new products and sales approaches… breaking logjams… and providing the quick approvals needed to kick winning sales campaigns into overdrive.
2. Taking up the rear – constantly driving everyone down the line to make supporting sales and marketing efforts their #1 priority.
BOTTOM LINE: Dumb Companies think that the Marketing Department exists to sell products. Smart Companies know that the only reason to have a product is to give the Marketing Department a vehicle with which it can attract new customers and produce revenues and profits.
My advice…
• If you own or run a Dumb Company, changing how you and your employees think about your business – the simple act of redefining it as a marketing business and ensuring that your corporate structure and procedures make sales and marketing #1 – is the first step to explosive growth.
• If you’re a marketing exec with a Dumb Company, you’re never going to be as successful as your peers at Smart Companies. If you can’t raise the company’s IQ, pack your bags!
• If you’re a marketing consultant or copywriter for a Dumb Company, finding a better class of clients will send your income skyrocketing.
[Ed. Note: Marketing is CRITICAL to the success of any business. You can discover the ins and outs of dozens of marketing channels - from search engine marketing to e-mail marketing and beyond - as a member of ETR's Internet Money Club. Our team of Internet marketing experts will guide you step by step through building and growing an Internet business. Space is limited, so find out now if you can still enroll in the "Class" of 2009.
Master copywriter Clayton Makepeace publishes the highly acclaimed e-zine The Total Package to help business owners and copywriters accelerate their sales and profits. Claim your 4 free money-making e-books - bursting with tips, tricks, and tactics that'll skyrocket your response - at MakepeaceTotalPackage.com. ]
Could This Be Your Perfect Remedy for the Recession?
A ‘robot’ made one man $80k in the last few months from other people’s greed.
All done without leaving his home, with virtually no risk, and best of all… virtually NO WORK…!
Thump Your Way to a Stronger Immune System
With cold and flu season here, your immune system needs extra TLC. Along with exercise and a low-glycemic, nutrient-rich diet, there’s something else you can do. Stimulate your thymus.
The thymus is a gland located just behind the sternum. And while it’s tiny (weighing no more than 30 grams and shrinking down to only 5 grams by the time you reach the age of 75), this immune organ has a big job: It cranks out T-cells. (The “T” stands for thymus.)
You can wake up your thymus with a simple and effective exercise that has been practiced for millennia. Here it is:
Make a loose fist (with either hand). Using the second row of knuckles, rhythmically tap on your breastbone with a heart-like beat – tap, tap, pause, tap, tap, pause. The tapping should be heavy enough to make a drumming sound, and you should feel a vibration (which is what stimulates the thymus).
Practice this immune-boosting exercise anytime – every day, if possible. (It is particularly beneficial when you feel like you’re getting sick.) Because the thymus is most active for 90 minutes after you fall asleep, doing this exercise just before bedtime is ideal. Aim for a minimum of 20 sets of 3 for a maximum of 5 minutes.
[Ed. Note: Improving your health doesn't have to be difficult or expensive. You can find more easy-to-follow health techniques - plus get recipes for plenty of wholesome, healthful meals and updates on the latest breakthroughs in health and fitness - in ETR's natural health newsletter. Sign up for free right here.
Survive the holidays with nutrition expert Kelley Herring's brand-new e-books, Guilt-Free Desserts and Healthy Holiday Hors d'Oeuvres. You'll find 60+ recipes you can easily make at home.]
10 Little Things I Love About the Holidays
By Melanie Segala, Managing Editor, Total Health Breakthroughs
1. Decorating the tree and the house with handmade decorations I’ve received from friends and family over the years. Each has a special memory.
2. Playing knockdown games of Trivial Pursuit with family and friends at my parents’ home in Buffalo – all the while sipping blackberry brandy.
3. Seeing friends who are home for the holidays at our favorite meet-up spot – TGI Friday’s at the mall.
4. Eating my aunt’s special beigli (a Hungarian Christmas pastry) for breakfast with a cup of coffee.
5. Going to midnight mass on Christmas Eve.
6. Setting the table for Christmas dinner. It’s pretty as a picture – and demolished an hour later!
7. Giving my husband a gift that he really loves and thanks me for all through the year. (So far, the winner has been the Sirius radio for his car.)
8. Going Christmas shopping with my mother and having lunch at a “fancy” restaurant.
9. The annual family Christmas party – a multi-generational fest that includes everyone from crying babies to 102-year-old Gram.
10. Watching It’s a Wonderful Life for the millionth time and remembering all I have to be thankful for.
[Ed. Note: What's your all-time favorite part of the holidays? Let us know right here.]
It’s Fun to Know: Frankincense and Myrrh
The Bible tells us that the Three Wise Men gave the Christ child gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Just as it is these days, gold was a valuable commodity 2,000 years ago. But what about the frankincense and myrrh? Well, at the time, they were among the most costly products in the world.
Both are types of incense, essentially the dried aromatic sap of shrubs that grow in parts of the Arabian Peninsula and the Horn of Africa. In biblical times, they were used (1) medicinally, (2) in perfume and makeup, and (3) in religious ceremonies (burned or made into oils). And they’re still used today in herbal remedies and cosmetics.
(Source: The Straight Dope and How Stuff Works)
== Highly Recommended ==
So Simple, You’ll Wonder Why You Didn’t Think of It!
What if everything you want to do could be just a little bit easier?
• That raise you’ve been gunning for could be suddenly within your grasp…
• You could drop that 15-pound “spare tire” from your belly in no time flat…
• More money could seemingly “float” into your bank account…
Sometimes, the most powerful strategies for achieving success are the simplest ones.
But once you’ve mastered them, success is right there in front of you.
Word to the Wise: Chauvinist
A “chauvinist” (SHOH-vuh-nist) is a person with a prejudiced belief in the superiority of his or her own kind. The word comes from Nicolas Chauvin, a legendary French soldier known for his extreme devotion to Napoleon.
Example (as used by Clayton Makepeace today): “Okay, I admit it: I’m a marketing chauvinist.”
[Ed. Note: Become a more persuasive writer and speaker ... build your self-confidence and intellect ... increase your attractiveness to others ... just by spending 10 VERY enjoyable minutes a day with ETR's new Words to the Wise CD Library.]
Copyright ETR, LLC, 2008
Similar Articles:
- How to Kill a Great Company in One Easy Lesson – Back in the 1980s, I agreed to help the owner of a small company grow his business. Within three yea…
- Thump Your Way to a Stronger Immune System – With cold and flu season here, your immune system needs extra TLC. Along with exercise and a low-gly…
- 4 Things You Should Look for Before Investing in a Company – When markets go down, not all companies go down equally. Some go down more than others. And some act…
- Do You Leave Your Customers Scratching Their Heads? – “Well, her pH looks good, and so does the CBC. But I’m worried about the electrolytes. You see here?…
- When the Sky Is Falling Should You Invest? – The good news: The market is offering bargain-basement sale prices on many stocks. The bad news: Pri…
- Never a Bad Time to Spend Wisely – Splurging in the middle of a recession is a no-no by Wall Street’s lights. They’re very good at puni…
- What Is an Eeyore Stock? (and How Can You Make Money on One?) – Believe it or not, stocks have personalities. They can be happy, sad/depressed, manic, or plodding. …
Decorations and cornbread stuffing, the peace and love that exists in my family, and the blessings throughout the year that Midnight Mass brings to mind.