With the plethora of big-business entities jockeying for the money of students on the path to becoming well-to-do responsible consumers with a house, car, and 1.5 children, it's often missed that the US Government is the first place to start when planning student finances.Scholarships, traineeships, fellowships, loans: Uncle Sam is nothing if not prolific in the diversity of programs available. For most students, the acroynm FAFSA is their first...more
There are a great many books and web sites devoted to real estate investing out there, but most of them concentrate on one specific area of investing. It's often hard to find a general description of real estate investing, one that lists the various real estate investing strategies and how to get started. That's what this article will set out to do.Before beginning, you must understand that real estate investing is not a get rich quick scheme. ...more
You need to determine what the value of a customer is to your company. Answer the following questions:How much will the average customer spend with you per year?A = _____________If you provide quality service and products, how many years can you expect to keep a customer ?B = _____________What is your gross profit, as a percentage of revenues?C = _____________The value (V) of a customer is:V = A X B X CWe learned with our network consulting company that the average life of a customer was about 2 ½ years and the average yearly expenditure was around $10,000. With a gross margin of 35%, each client was worth $8750 to the company.$10,000 X 2.5 * .35 = $8750If you haven't used this simple formula before, it can totally change how you view customer acquisition, retention and customer service. Normally you'll want to spend about 10% of current or projected revenues on customer acquisition. This formula allows you to accurately project what a customer is worth to you over their customer life cycle.A valuable concept to learn and leverage is to go to great lengths to keep a good customer. The simplest and least intensive marketing efforts are those that you do for existing customers. Stay...more
ReferralsA substantial part of your business can come from referrals. The key is to provide extraordinary customer service and educate your clients and influencers to this fact. You must actively cultivate referrals; otherwise you're just leaving it to chance.Referrals Start with Great ServiceThe foundation of great referrals is great customer...more
Client satisfaction starts with meeting or beating the contractual obligations of the relationship. There are also some intangibles that can help you to over deliver to a client. MeetingsIn most organizations it's easy to deliver additional value around meetings, because statistically, most companies run meetings poorly. Capture important notes...more
Most consultants I've talked to don't spend any time trying to recover inactive clients and it's a big mistake. We tend to magnify the problem we had or just want to move on, but sometimes a simple apology and offering to make things right will bring you back a client worth thousands of dollars in billing.Clients can quit contacting you for a number of reasons: They had a bad experience. They no longer need your product or service. As their needs evolved, they believed your company no longer could offer what they need. They just got busy and forgot about you. You can see how important it is to have a communication process to stay in contact with clients as some quit calling for the sole reason of "out of sight, out of mind." Think about all the vendors that you've stopped buying from for no real reason. It happens to everyone.There are clients that you have consciously let go because they are bad clients. I recommend consistently "firing" the bottom 5-10 percent of your client base as a regular practice. But most consultants have an attrition rate higher than that.Make a Target ListGo through your database making a careful list of clients you have done business with in the past but...more
There is a saying that goes, "The best offense is a great defense". Nowhere is that applied better in the corporate world than in the intelligent use of email. In this age of technology, E-mail is a multi-purpose tool that can be adapted into each...more
Good credit is everyone's dream. A wise use of credit can go a long way. It certainly makes certain goals in life (like acquiring business loan from bank) easily attainable.But the key question remains: "What does it take to achieve 'Triple A'...more
When I look around at all of my friends, and a lot of my family, I see a lot of people living from pay check to pay check, under monetary stress. These same people watch the Calendar for payday like a hawk. Pay their bills, and then open up the...more
With the advancement of computer simulators, anybody can repeat all the business routines before he goes to the real world, and have the opportunity of relaxing from the tedious work with numbers. The businessman can concentrate more on the human...more
Got stacks of audio tapes that need to be converted to a more user-friendly format? Professional transcription services may be the answer. Professional transcriptionists can take standard or micro cassette tapes and produce a typed version of the...more
"Who is that hot babe in the picture?" isn't the type of reply an interviewer expects to hear when he or she invites you to ask questions near the end of an interview. In fact, the way you approach the Q&A session will have a direct impact on the...more