it’s time to take action!

You must be action oriented if you wish to experience the greatest level of prosperity in your life. Initially, it is most important to have the correct mental attitude towards the issue of wealth, and I have tried to supply you with the tools to help you think constructively. But now it is time for physical action. You must put yourself out into the world, give freely of your energy, your spirit and your knowledge, and watch the cash flow back to you. I have tried to ingrain an action oriented consciousness in you by having you do one simple task towards prosperity each day. Now it is your turn to figure out what you can contribute each day in order to receive true wealth.
It is pointless to spend thirty days developing your consciousness if you are not willing to follow through with the actions necessary to stake your claim to prosperity in this world. Although you will inevitably reap the rewards of training your mind in this way, true freedom will elude you if you rely only on the power of your thoughts. You must merge thought with action. Just as it is ineffective to take action in the world without having the proper conscious focus, without knowing your direction and deliberately acting towards your goals, in the same way it is useless to know your goals but refuse to take action towards them.
Remember the karmic law of action and reaction: the more of yourself that you give, the more you open yourself to receive. Remember also the very simplest action you can take: to daily put aside five or ten minutes to re-impress upon your mind the truths of prosperity consciousness. You have done this now for one month, I strongly recommend you continue this habit. Whatever you consistently sow, you will reap, so remember to sow thoughts of abundance and you will inevitably reap wealth and prosperity.
Take five minutes right now and feel the truth of these words :
I WILL TAKE ACTION TOWARDS MY FINANCIAL FREEDOM. I WILL GIVE OF MYSELF FREELY, AND I WILL FREELY ACCEPT THE GIFTS OF THE UNIVERSE. I WILL CONSISTENTLY SOW THOUGHTS OF ABUNDANCE AND PROSPERITY.
TAKE ACTION : You have already habitualized yourself to take ten short minutes out of each day to develop your consciousness. Today, decide to continue this habit even after you complete this program. Decide what action you can take for ten minutes each day that will improve your life. Ten minutes of visualizing your goals, or of affirming positive thoughts, or of reading inspiring books is all it takes to keep your mind focussed on the positive in your life. Decide now to actively pursue a constructive life from
this day forward.
Thomas Henry Huxley : “The great end of life is not knowledge but action.”

by Andreas Ohrt

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Selecting the Right Property for Investing

by: Gary Fee

Anyone can make money in real estate when the market is booming in your area. The trick to making a solid investment that pays out big in today?s market is to follow the process used by the professionals. The first question that you have to ask is which property is right for me? If you are new to real estate investment, or have lost your shirt trying to flip properties in the past, please pay attention to the points I will lay out in this article. Pros never buy based on a hunch or a guess. They always do their homework.

Basic Economics

We all know that the market is the intersection of Supply and Demand. The set price of goods or services is wherever consumer demand meets producer supply. In real estate, demand always sets price. However, real estate is more complex than just that, and you need to research why market indicators in your area are the way they are in order to make a wise investment. Why is there a high or low demand, what is driving the prices up or down, what are people looking for, are people making more money now? Of course, you are going to be looking for markets with a strong demand and low supply for investing techniques like flipping and wholesaling. However, even markets with a below average demand and above average supply of real estate can yield decent profits through investment techniques such as listing with a lease option and buying a home for rental.

Making money requires that you know when the market will go bad, or begin to boom. Waiting until after the market changes before making your move is a good way to do poorly. You will want to know when the market in your area is at its highest so that you can sell off and take your profits, and at the low end, ready to head up again, so you can get in on the best deals for future profit. You can leave this to chance, or you can pay attention to the market indicators and let them show you where it is going before it moves.

Market Indicators

Some indicators are more important than are others, but all should be considered before making an investment. When doing your research remember that your local numbers and statistics will not necessarily reflect those of the national market. Real estate values are always local in nature.

-Housing Affordability-

The National Association of Realtors (NAR) has an index that gauges median income against median price. A rating of 100% means that the median earner has just enough income to purchase a median priced home, assuming a 20% down payment. An index number above 100% means that the median earner has more than enough money to qualify for a loan on the same homes with the same money down. A rating of 100% is ideal for a growing market and a higher supply.

-Population Growth-

In general, a growing population means increased demand for real estate. For instance, if the average growth over the past five years in your town has been 3%, but a new highway and industrial park drive more people to the area then the population growth rate will probably increase. Supposing that the local chamber and county planning commission expect the growth rate to approach 10% in the near future, you will want to invest in this market.

-Employment-

Employment is a good indicator for an obvious reason. If chronic unemployment is high because of problems with local industry, like in Michigan, then this may not be the best time to invest in working class housing serving the needs of the auto industry because there simply is no money to buy real estate, and because people are leaving the area to seek employment elsewhere. On the other hand, investors who saw the increase in major corporations moving their operations to North Carolina made a huge profit. These companies brought a large influx of upper-middle class wage earners seeking housing and employment. The market there is still booming. Noticing the up or down shift in employment figures can help you predict the market ahead of its shift. The best indicators are low unemployment and a growing local industry.

-Consumer Confidence-

A market with high consumer confidence should do well. Low consumer confidence can depress a market through reticence to buy because consumers are unsure of their future earning potential. As expected, this hedges prices down. The NAR also measures consumer confidence. A score over 100 means that consumers have confidence in the economy, while a score under 100 means that consumers have less confidence, and the real estate market will reflect that. High consumer confidence often comes with low unemployment rates and a strong economy.

-House Sales-

The sale of homes is a direct indicator of how well the market is doing. High inventories, with homes sitting for more than 120 days will hedge prices down into a buyers market. If inventories and average time on the market are low then prices will be higher, and the time will be ripe for quick deals and investment techniques like rehabbing and wholesaling. You should be aware that sellers using multiple agents listing separately, and agents delisting and relisting properties could manipulate the putative Days on Market (DOM).

Home sales are really a following indicator. It is usually the result of higher consumer confidence, employment, and affordability.

-Interest Rates-

Lower rates often result in higher prices and more qualified buyers. Do not overestimate the importance of this indicator, though, for when consumer confidence is high, higher rates will have less of an impact on the market. Be on the lookout for cash-following properties when rates are low. Sometimes a percentage point can be the difference between a positive cash flow and a negative one.

Best Investment Properties

To put the odds in your favor, look for standard investment properties. Avoid the quaint and the kooky, and never buy an investment property just because you would want to live there. For the fastest turn-around, you want properties that will appeal to the greatest number of people. The point of investing in real estate is to get your investment back with a healthy profit. To that end, I recommend the following qualifications to ensure a quick flip.

* Priced right for you
* Needs a little work
* 5 to 50 years old
* Single-family dwelling
* Three bedrooms with two baths
* Decent area
* Priced from the lower median to median for your area

The price should be about 65% to 70% below the After Rehab Value (ARV) for a good discount. I will explain that later. You should keep the rehab costs between $10,000 and $12,000, which means that you want to avoid older homes that might need electrical or plumbing system replacements. Nothing sells better than single-family homes with three bedrooms and two baths. The best areas are working class neighborhoods where first-time homebuyers would want to live. Finally, most buyers will be looking for homes priced in the lower median through median range. Give the people what they want.

Getting Your Money Back

As an example, take a property that had an ARV of $150,000. Subtract 35% or $52,500, and you get a purchase price of $97,500. The reason you want to find property at this discount is that in order to get cash at closing, I advocate using a hard money lender to purchase the property, rehab it, and then either sell it again at $150,000 or refinance the property to put a new loan on it. Most hard money lenders will only loan 65% to 70% on the property. Some will loan on the After Rehab Value, and some will loan on the Fair Market Value. The key strategy for your success in flipping property is to work with lenders who loan on the ARV.

Surprisingly, this is one of the best markets for finding properties with this kind of discount transaction. Another benefit of using hard money lenders is that they will review the property value and estimate the rehab costs so you will have someone checking your work to make sure you got it right. To learn more about hard lenders please follow the link below.

Gary Fee
http://www.fast4close.com

Aquinas Company
21390 Bagby Road
Bowling Green, VA 22427

About The Author

Gary Fee is a professional trainer whose clients have included Fortune 500 firms, Federal agencies, technical schools, and colleges. He runs a sometimes amusing blog about starting home based businesses at http://makewhatyouareworth.blogspot.com

The author invites you to visit: http://www.fast4close.com

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Professional Health Care Business Card Designs That Does the Job

by: Geraldine Anderson

The health care industry is a people-oriented business and it will be certainly advantageous for health care professionals to be viewed as pleasant and easy to talk to. One of the ways to achieve this is through nicely designed business cards that reflect a caring and understanding personality behind the card.

No one understands this better than people who work in the health care business. People who seek professional health care are understandably under some pain. They would expect that their health care provider should at least empathize with them. People in pain require that they can count on their health care provider when they need them.

No other tool that can do this effectively yet inexpensively than the use of business cards. There are lots of business cards out there that to think that all of them are alike and will have the same effect might be a costly mistake for health care providers. When people are in pain, they are more likely to be more sensitive than average healthy people.

Your business cards will not only serve to provide your patients and people around you the information that they need when they need you. Of course, any sensible person would include the important information such as addresses and phone numbers, however, the special sensitivity of patients and their loved ones will probably notice a little more.

Even the size, color and style of fonts will be noticed and commented upon by your card recipients. In turn, their comments will give impression as to the kind of personality that you have. If you have a disorder or untidy looking business card, naturally, it will reflect on your personality as someone disorganize.

In the same vein, if you have a business cards that looks really presentable showing that a lot of effort and thought has gone through in the making of the card, it will reflect on your personality as someone who really cares about his profession, and in turn, will be viewed as someone who really cares for his or her patients.

All in all, a business card is not simply a tool that you hand out so you don’t have to write down your important details on a piece of paper every time you want to disseminate important information about your profession. A very effective business card should be able to get you more clients, more renowned in your field, and most of all, lets your card precedes your reputation for kindness, compassion and professionalism in your work.

About The Author

Get your free products for 250 business cards , 14 standard post cards and 6 jumbo magnet calendars and a whole lot more only at http://www.bizcard.com/industry/health-care .
The author invites you to visit:
http://www.bizcard.com

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Identifying Brochure Problems

by: Janice Jenkins
Are you having trouble with your color brochures? Did you spend all that time, money and effort in brochure printing only to discover that they are not giving you the results that you want? Well there are several key factors why brochure printing can fail. In this guide, we will share with you some tips on how to identify these possible problems and correct them.

Do an opinion survey: The first thing that you need to do to identify any problems with your brochures is to do a survey. Look for the people that you gave your brochures to, and ask them a few questions about their reactions to it. Also, try to find other groups of people to give your brochures to, and then ask them immediately afterwards of their opinion about it. If you gather data that is large enough, chances are good that you should see a growing trend where your brochures fail to impress your readers. This should be a key factor on how to improve your brochure designs on the next printing run.

Re-analyze your target readers: Next, you may want to study once again your target readers or target market for your brochures. You may discover suddenly that your target market is inappropriate for your brochure, or that your brochure content is not ideal for your particular target market. This can be a common mistake for brochure printing, since some people just assume immediately what their target readers like while actually not researching what those are. So try to reanalyze your target reader’s wants and needs by looking at market research data about them.

Revise distribution techniques: You may want to check your distribution technique as well if it is indeed effective. Did you just hand out your brochures to people on the street? Did you mail them to several addresses in a mailing list? Or maybe you just left them behind in public places. Try to review these techniques if they are indeed effective and people are picking them up and reading. If you look closely enough you should identify key problems that make a certain technique not work. For example, you may be mailing brochures to the wrong kind of people or the public places that you leave your brochures to are not really where you target market is. So revise your distribution techniques accordingly and try other methods to see if those others can work better.

Find another location: Also, you may want to look at your distribution policies for your brochures. Sometimes brochures can fail because they have been given in the wrong locations. Try to determine who the most common type of people that pass by your distribution zones. Also if you mailed some of your brochures, try to see the demographic data on the neighborhoods that you sent them to. You may discover that your brochure message will not really be interesting or be well received by the people in your distribution area. When this happens, it might be a good idea to shift your distribution efforts elsewhere.

Use multiple concepts: Finally, you may want to branch out to several design concepts for your brochures and test them out separately. By testing multiple concept designs for your brochures, you should be able to identify which design works, and which does not have enough of an impact to customers This should be the last step in troubleshooting the problems on your brochure since this basically decides if you will change your whole brochure or not.

Hopefully by the fifth type of check, you should already identify the problems inherent in your brochure. Just try to be patient and methodical about analyzing your brochure problems so that you can identify it and rectify is as soon as you can. With some determination and hope you should be able to turn your brochure printing around before any kind of permanent harm is one for your business.

For comments and inquiries about the article visit:
http://www.printplace.com/printing/brochure-printing.aspx, http://www.printplace.com/printing/full-color-brochure-printing.aspx

About The Author

Janice Jenkins is a writer for a marketing company in Chicago, IL. Mostly into marketing research, Janice started writing articles early 2007 to impart her knowledge to individuals new to the marketing industry.

Visit the author's web site at: http://www.printplace.com

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How To Use Logo Effectively For Your Business

by: Keith Ng

A logo is a design or image that represents a company, brand or product. Its target is to help people identify the company with a positive buyer experience. It is the basis of all future branding, advertising and communication methods. Each Company wanted to prove it was essentially the best.

The appearance of emblems caused a revolution in the advertising world. More companies began demanding a novel symbol that is part of their business for future years.

The symbol wants to go through total tests in order to make a novel place in the market its brand owners operate in. Never forget that once selected, your logo will be a silent medium that may communicate the firm's ideals and philosophy. The logo should be electrifying and at the same time should not be over dramatic. The design elements need to be as few as possible so that the brand does not appear to be packed with different image parts. It should be in a position to draw in the consumers the company wants to draw in.

As an example, studies indicate that using bright colors does not create the brand confidence in finance related firms. Finance firms are recommended to stick by the standard grey, blues and reds. In my point of view, there is no point being another face in the bunch. So stand out and if you dare, be different. It should reflect the firm's business, products / services. It should be straightforward to compact and still uniquely keep its design elements.

Logo creates the loyalty of the company. Future clients form an opinion of a business within seconds and the brand plays a giant part in deciding this. Each aspect of the logo's design should be scrupulously investigated to make certain the right message is being communicated. Logos leave superb impressions possessing an enduring and a deep result on the hearts and minds of the viewers.

About The Author

Keith Ng is a Trainer and Online Business Consultant, who is specializing in web solutions and readymade business turnkey websites. He is also a professional designer, who provide 3D graphics like ecover design and minisites for many individuals and companies. His portfolio page at Ecover Membership

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Warm Calling Can Make You Rich Quick

by: Randy Babi
There are many different ways to get rich quick. It can happen fast, but only when you have the knowledge and know how to get rich, that is when you can go against mainstream knowledge and begin to learn the shortcuts to getting rich. When you have these secrets to getting rich you can then go ahead and make a substantial amount of money in minimal time, thus increasing your rich status. Let me start with the different ways.

Today, I am going to go with the way that is the hardest to calibrate but gives you near instant results. We have all heard of cold calling, which is calling a prospect seemingly right out of the white pages. Warm calling is someone who wants to get rich quick, signs his name, email and phone number into a lead site which then affiliates can buy very cheaply (about 1,000 a day for $19.99 a month or so), call and pitch the idea.

This would terrify most people, about as much as public speaking. The reason why is not because they do not want to get rich, it is because of our tribal background. Several thousands of years ago, everyone lived in villages and knew each other, so anything you did or said to anybody else would be known throughout the village, causing you embarrassment or worse. You will not get rich with this mindset.

In today’s world, the idea of calling someone with absolutely no connection to you can still make your heart skip a beat. The truth is that it should not give you any fear at all. These people do not know you, they do not know anybody you know and do not even think about the whole process they way you do. They either make you richer by buying or signing up or they hang up, never to be seen or heard from again. That is what should be going through your mind at all times while warm calling.

To be successful and get rich quick with warm calling, you first have to find that connect with your primal feelings and then DISCONNECT! If you want to get rich quickly with this kind of marketing you need to have no fear of the call. You have to remember that these people have requested the information that you are giving them. They are pretty much waiting by their phones with credit card in hand waiting to join your program or buy your product. What is the worst that can happen? They hang up and you’re done with them. That’s it. Nobody is going to come to your home or work and no complaints will be filed against you. In all my years warm calling, either in affiliate marketing or when I worked in mortgages, the worst thing that ever happened to me was a man called me back to apologize for being rude to me and he ended up joining my program and is now making 6 figures a year!

So when it comes to warm calling, it can make you rich quickly if you know how and you get over the fear of the call. Just keep telling yourself that we do not live in tribes anymore and that the worst thing that can happen to you is to get a sale or sign-up!

About The Author

Randy Babi is a former loan officer and successful internet marketer who has a reputation for going above and beyond in order to help who he sponsors become successful as well. Visit his website at http://www.SucceedIn24Hours.com.

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Management Tip: Quit Working For Your Boss

by: Daryl Cowie

As a manager do you know who you really work for? I don't mean the person who signs your paycheck or does your annual review. I mean day by day, hour by hour, who are you working for?

If you say it's your customers, that's great you've been paying attention in marketing class. Ultimately everyone is working for the customer, but is that really who you work for on a daily basis? Do you personally take their orders? Do you personally answer the support calls? Do you get in the truck and drive your product over to the customer to help them unload and get it ready to use? If you are a manager I truly hope this is not what you come to work to do. These are the things your team is there to do. You may need to pitch in from time to time, but that's not what managers are primarily there to do.

If you say it's your supervisor, well I'm sure they will be happy to hear that. Your supervisor should be the one to define your purpose in the organization and help give you direction. So you could say the work you do on a daily or hourly basis is work for your supervisor. But is that really who you spend the bulk of your time trying to help? I hope not.

Let's look at the activities good managers spend their time on. Employee development, process optimization, cost control. You make sure your people know what needs to be done and are working on the right things. You make sure your people have the tools they need to get the job done effectively and efficiently. You make sure your people get to work in a safe and respectful environment. You make sure your people get the training they need to be effective and advance. You look for ways to make your team as effective as possible. You help your people become the best they can be. You help your team become the best it can be. The bulk of the work you do (or should be doing) is for your team. You work for your team.

So as a manager forget the idea that everyone is working for you. That thinking leads you down the path to ego and conflict. Your team is working to get things done for the customer. You, as their manager, are working for your team to get them everything they need to be effective in serving your customers. The best, most highly-valued managers alive are the ones out there working for their teams and giving them everything they need to succeed.

The more people you manage, the more people you are working for, not the other way around. A bigger team doesn't take away your work, it increases it.

So the next time you draw your team organization chart, flip it upside down with your CEO at the bottom, you somewhere in the middle, and the people who actually come in contact with the customer on a daily or hourly basis at the top where they belong. The goal of a great manager is to create the best team of people at the top of this upside down pyramid serving the customer.

About The Author

Daryl Cowie has shared management tips with 1000s of people in over 30 countries around the world. His mission is to help you and your company turn business opportunities into business realities. Sign up for his free business management home study course at http://FreeManagementTips.com

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Customer Service Management Tips - Part 2

by: Daryl Cowie

In part 1 we discussed the importance of Post-Sale Customer Support teams in retaining repeat customers, and why this is so important. Now let's look at some practical customer service management tips to help you get the job done.

What Is the Role of Customer Support

The customer support team needs to ensure customers are happy by representing the customer's interests inside the business at time when no one else is motivated to do so.

The customer support team, along with the sales team, represents the customer's interests inside the company. The sales team does it to get new customers. The support team does it to keep existing customers.

The major challenge that customer support teams face within most organizations is that it is hard to tie specific support activity to a specific amount of revenue dollars. There is always a temptation to ignore your existing customers, because they probably won't leave right away. There is always a temptation to ignore any customer that doesn't have an open order because as a business you need to raise enough money to pay your bills and your employees in order to stay in business.

What Can Support Team Managers Do?

As a Customer Support manager, there are a few things you can do to help your cause.

Recognize that fundamentally the Customer Support team is there to ensure repeat orders. Know the repeat order potential of each customer and factor that into the time, money and priority you give any given customer. Very often a small number of customers take up a large percentage of the customer support time and budget. Make sure you are not neglecting the high potential customers because you are busy serving the needs of needy customers with lower potential. I know we like to help everyone, but let's face it you make priority decisions every day on which issues to handle first. Many customer support teams have no idea what the repeat order potential of any given customer is. Make sure you know, and make sure that repeat order potential is at least as big a factor in your decisions as how loud the customer is. Tying action to financials will get the attention and support of upper management.

Get to know the Sales team. In most organizations the sales teams are much more influential than the support teams, it's just a fact of life. The sales teams are also the people inside the company who benefit the most from good customer support. They get the credit and the commission checks for repeat orders. Let the sales team know when their high potential customers are having issues, and when you are not getting the support you need to help them. You can be guaranteed that a commissioned sales rep will not sit idly by and risk losing a repeat customer. Keep the sales team in the loop. When things go well, tell them. It's a great opportunity for them to go in and make their next pitch. When problems are brewing, tell them that too so they can avoid walking into the lion's den with a new sales pitch, and instead make a timely service call to show they care and offer assistance. The sales team is motivated, influential, and has the most to lose from poor customer service. You already have the power to help them; use it to help them help you.

Look for ways to actively help your customers use the products or services they buy from you. Don't just wait for complaints and repair calls to come in. Think of ways that you could help your customer's use your products. Think about this. If you can help a customer use something he or she has already purchased, they will be much more likely to come back a second time. If you can help a customer use up something he or she has already purchased then they will need to come back and replenish their stock. Remember that customer support is there to help the customer use the product or service. Why do you think craft stores sponsor craft fairs? Because it helps people use up their craft supplies, and it also makes them happy. If you can help them use it up, or consume it, then you can rightly claim that you have helped the customer and increased revenue for the business when their frequency of buying increases. Be creative.

Summary

Fundamentally the role of customer support is to ensure repeat sales. Post-sale customer support teams are a critical cog in the business cycle. They should be respected. They should be in constant communication with the sales team. They should be actively looking for ways to help the customer use the products or services they have purchased.

As a customer service manager one of the best things you can do for your team is to learn to tie their actions to the business financials. That's how decisions are made at the top.

About The Author

Daryl Cowie has shared management tips with 1000s of people in over 30 countries around the world. His mission is to help you and your company turn business opportunities into business realities. Sign up for his free business management home study course at http://FreeManagementTips.com

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Customer Service Management Tips - Part 1

by: Daryl Cowie

Customer support teams are perhaps the most misunderstood, and underappreciated teams in the business world. In many businesses the customer support staff talks to the customers more than every other team combined. They play a critical role in ensuring customers are satisfied. Satisfied customers are repeat customers. Everybody knows that a large percentage of business comes from repeat customers. And yet customer support teams are commonly staffed with junior, inexperienced people that don't have the authority to make any decisions, or the training and knowledge to answer difficult questions. What's the deal?

What is Customer Support?

First, let's clarify what I mean by "Customer Support", because different companies use this term in wildly different ways. I am talking about the team that takes care of the customer after the contract has been signed and the initial invoice has been paid. You may work in a company where a customer service team handles the transaction from order to invoice. You may have been taught that customer service starts when the customer walks in the door, and doesn't end until the customer dies or decides not to be a customer any more. These are fine concepts, but what I am talking about here is the role of taking care of the customers' needs after the invoice has been paid, and before they have expressed a specific interest in buying again. I refer to this as Post-Sale Customer Support to differentiate it from other definitions.

What's So Important About Post-Sale Customer Support?

As a customer, up until the time that the invoice is paid you always hold the trump card of being able to withhold payment if you are not satisfied. And everybody understands that money talks. After the invoice has been paid you can often be left feeling powerless. The delivery team has collected their money and been assigned a full load of new customer transactions to look after. The sales team is being pressured to focus on customers who have already expressed a specific interest in making a purchase to meet monthly sales targets. So who takes care of you now?

This is where customer support comes in. There is a general feeling within most companies that they need to provide some sort of post-sale customer support, but there is a poor understanding of why. The sales team brings in the customers – which equals the promise of money. The orders team works out the details – which equals the promise of money. The delivery team provides the solution – which equals the collection of actual money. The customer support team ensures the customer is able to use the solution – which equals what? Happiness and karma? Let's face it; shareholders can't trade in their karma for a retirement home. Companies want money.

Here's what people are missing. In a healthy business between 25 and 75 percent of all revenues should come from repeat customers. 25% to 50% is considered typical for a healthy retail outlet, and 75% repeat business would be the top end for a healthy service business. Retail outlets with less than 25% repeat business are probably not meeting their customer needs or more of them would be coming back. Service businesses with more than 75% repeat sales are probably losing their skills at generating new customers and run the risk of severe financial problems if they lose 1 or 2 major accounts. Any way you look at it, a very large part of your business should be coming from repeat customers.

The other factor you need to look at is that the cost of getting a new customer is much higher than the cost of keeping a customer that you already have. Marketing and advertising are expensive business.

Smart businesses invest in retaining customers. That's what customer support is all about. There is no better time to ensure repeat business than when your customers are feeling that they have no leverage. That is exactly when they appreciate your support the most, and will remember it as something that makes them want to come back.

In part 2 of this series we'll look at some practical management tips for customer service managers to get the business behind your team and your customers.

About The Author

Daryl Cowie has shared management tips with 1000s of people in over 30 countries around the world. His mission is to help you and your company turn business opportunities into business realities. Sign up for his free business management home study course at http://FreeManagementTips.com

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The Unsuccessful Habits of Hard Working People

by: Daryl Cowie

We've all heard the phrase work smarter, not harder. It's one of those motivational statements that once held a great message, but now days is more often used to mean "You're taking too long. Quit complaining and get it done". In many ways these messages are not that different, but they hold two very different sentiments.

The truth is, many of us need to work smarter instead of harder, but we don't really know how to get from where we are to where we need to be. I was brought up believing that hard work is the key to success and fulfillment. Work harder than anyone else and you'll get recognition for it. While this is true in many ways, this philosophy can also severely restrict the level of success you achieve.

While working hard truly is a virtue, it also has some basic failings. First of all the hard work principle lends itself to measuring how hard, or long you work instead of what you are getting done. Many hard workers feel they are entitled to rewards as long as they put in long hours or carry heavy loads. It can lead to resentment of people who have figured out how to work shorter hours for larger rewards. Instead of admiring them, you see them as lazy and undeserving. Hard workers are often frustrated by the efforts of people around them that they feel are not making the same contribution, or reaching the same level of productivity as they are. What the "hard working" crowd is missing is that every employee is hired to get a result, not to fill an empty space.

Look at it this way. Pretend for a moment that you were doing the hiring and paying the bill. Would you rather pay a hard working man with an axe for 2 months to clear your land of trees, or pay a lazy dude with a chainsaw who can do it in one month? What I'd really like is a hard working man with a chainsaw, but given the choices I'll take the man who made the smart tool choice over the one who works hard. Why? Bottom line, it gets the job done faster and cheaper, which is what I really want.

The second failing of the hard working philosophy is a tendency to want to jump into action without a well thought out plan. Let’s get moving! The problem with this is that the devil is in the details. I have seen many hastily laid plans leap into instant action and gain immediate progress. I have seen just as many of these plans sitting in the trash bin after huge amounts of time and money have been invested in them because they didn't actually accomplish what the customer really wanted. By the time they figured they weren't going to meet the real requirements they had too much invested in the hastily chosen direction to make the required corrections. A common companion of these discarded plans is the discarded manager who goes along with it. Action is critical, but first you must ensure your actions contribute to a plan that actually ends in the right results.

In both cases of these cases, the work hard philosophy is missing the main opportunity. A smart plan is better than a hard working plan every time. But we are taught to spring to action. Get to work. Get it started. The reality is that working hard without a plan is fruitless. Working hard at things no one cares about is simply not productive.

Making smart choices that contribute to the results that matter to other people is one of the keys to success. Solid up-front goals and objectives planning sessions are critical to your personal success and to the success of everything you endeavor to do. If you're a hard working person, learning to effectively recognize the goals and intelligently plan objectives and strategies to accomplish them is one of the best investments you can make in yourself.

My success management tip for hard workers: learn to plan smart first, and then work hard. This is the unbeatable combination.

About The Author

Daryl Cowie has shared management tips with 1000s of people in over 30 countries around the world. His mission is to help you and your company turn business opportunities into business realities. Sign up for his free business management home study course at http://FreeManagementTips.com

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