Many financial services power-housese.g., Fidelity, CitiBank, Merrill Lynch and MetLife, have adopted a marketing positioning strategy that portrays them as leaders in virtually all segments of the market. As a result, their financial sales and marketing campaigns focus on casting a very wide net in order to attract the largest possible market.The practices of these industry "Goliaths" have spawned many financial services "Davids" who believe...more
Effective communication skills are essential to successful business development. Yet they're often under-emphasized and sometimes completely ignored. Why? Because we communicate so much and so often (approximately 20,000 words per day) we often take it for granted. But regardless of how good your product or service is and how much expertise you have in your area, it all goes to waste unless you can communicate it to others. When you actually...more
You must decide for yourself whether you will charge for your services or not. Should you decide to charge, the next question is "what should my fee be?"1. Determine What You Need To MakeWhen setting fees, part of the calculation is how much you need (and want!) to make. If you first decide how much profit you need to make, you can then determine what to charge in order to make that profit. It's necessary to do a personal and family budget first, to determine the minimum you need to bring into your home each month. In addition to that minimum, add the amount you'd want that would give you the lifestyle you want. If you're just starting a business, you may have to make ends meet with other income or savings, but you need to have a goal of the full amount you want to bring home each month when you have a successful business. While income isn't the only measure of success, NOT making enough money in your business will bring frustration and dissatisfaction.2. Research Your Fee OptionsFirst, examine carefully your skill level. It is common practice in business to charge based on skill. The more skill and experience you have, the more you charge. You have several choices on how your...more
Here's a bunch of important things you should know about day trading before you start. First off, can you daytrade if you don't have the requisite $25,000 plus? Yes. You can start Day Trading with as little as $750 if you decide to trade using a spreadbetting account rather than a standard broker, allowing you to ignore most day trading regulations...more
Video conferencing is a friend of the environment. It helps reduce the volume of CO2 emissions from cars and reduces traffic congestion on our roads (as well as improving company productivity and reducing costs!). As governments throughout the world look to cut their CO2 emissions to meet global treaties, such as Kyoto, companies can use video...more
Recent mergers in many industries remind me of a point that Gen. Dwight Eisenhower often made, "Generals move the pins on a map," he would say, "but the front-line troops have to get the job done."And the key to the job is leadership, small-unit leadership, leadership of the most basic units or teams of an organization. Without good leadership in front-line units the squad leaders and platoon commanders or their business counterparts, the supervisors and first-level managers organizations stumble, no matter how skillfully the pins are moved on the map.Yet in bringing leadership programs to many businesses in a variety of industries during the past 20 plus years, I've seen many companies neglecting small-unit leadership.Time and again, I have seen technologists promoted right off the lab bench to become team leaders; I've seen assembly workers promoted off the line to be supervisors; and salespeople made local managers and yet they were not helped in substantive ways with their leadership skills.Instead, their employers were focusing on the pins and maps, the re-engineering, acquisitions and divestitures.Sure, the stocks of those businesses got quick boosts, but I wonder...more
The greatest occupational high that financial services Marketing Directors experience is bringing a vision to market through a financial product or service innovation. Seeking to experience the same euphoria that great inventors like Benjamin...more
Do you have an idea for a business? Perhaps the only idea you have is that you NEED an idea so you CAN start a business. Before turning any idea into a business, you must first have an idea how to succeed. For most people, the definition of a...more
Practical Biz Solutions The business success newsletter for business owners, top executives, and commission sales people from Stan MannPlease forward Practical Biz Solutions to appropriate friends.Dear Reader: High Achievers have great strengths....more
Why do some teams perform well while others struggle? How can you assess how effectively your team is working now, and identify methods for improvement?Research shows that 85% of the reasons that teams of people succeed or struggle has more to do...more
If you gather 100 experienced leaders together to share with you their most important secrets for success, you probably wouldn't hear a lot of academic theory or jargon. Instead, this is a good idea of what you'd hear:1) Put ethics first. If you...more
Before you call your next meeting, the FIRST step is to decide if it is really essential. To determine that, ask yourself the following: Is this meeting essential? Can we do without it? Can we accomplish the task without a meeting? Can it wait...more