Perseverance and the Lag factor

When you are new to web business it is often a while before you see results. This is caused by the lag factor. I notice this when I change the program I am leading my promotions with.

I often advertise for 2 weeks or so before the sign ups come. At the moment I am promoting Force Hits and I got my first referral after advertising the link for over 2 weeks.

I know this pattern now as I have seen it hundreds of times in the past. So what causes this lag factor?

The main thing is exposure. The first thing is awareness, people become aware that your homepage has changed. They may see your page 30 times before it really registers. This is where perseverance comes in. I know that I need about 10,000 views of my advertisement to gain one upgraded member.

I track my hits via Trck.me (see under Top Tools link) so I know where my traffic comes from.

Don't give up, give an ad time to get awareness and exposure. Some people change ads every few days if they don't get results - this is a mistake.

Good luck

Check out my website today at http://drkelp.co.uk - Force Hits (homepage) and NerdBux (PTC tab) are my top 2 sites at the moment.

Ciao

Grant aka Dr Kelp

What is the Purpose of business?

There are two points of view on the purpose of business.

The most commonly mentioned one is "to make money". Increasing wealth for the stakeholders is the driving force.

Opposed to this view is the one that posits that business leaders need a sense of being called upon to seek the common good, to make a difference, to make the world a better place for their having been there.

This wider view shares benefits across society rather than the benefits going to a small elite of shareholders and owners.

It is very encouraging to see billionaires like Bill Gates and Warren Buffett using considerable amounts of their substantial fortunes to reach out and help others. This is ethical business behavior that should be applauded.

DK

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Business - Dealing with the Future

Business, more than any other occupation, is a continual dealing with the future; it is a continual calculation, an instinctive exercise in foresight.

Henry R. Luce

How true that saying is. Our survival depends on how we handle the future. Unfortunately many business people and politicians ignore this valuable lesson. We only have to look at the end result of the MBA explosion in the 1980's to realise this. The living out of a short term strategy and maximisation of short term profit led directly to the Great Financial Crisis that hit us in the late 2010's and is still with us today.
DK

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Talent Acquisition and Retention

Have you heard the Human Resources mantra, "Recruit and retain"?

It is a cornerstone of talent acquisition and development. Get the best people possible and keep them. A number of recent studies by McKinsey, The EIA and PMI have identified the key need for agile and talented staff to meet the challenges of the global marketplace in a rapidly changing environment. In the past businesses looked for long term and steady strategies to build their businesses. This is no longer good enough.

If you stand still, you will stagnate, innovation and agility are the new prerequisites for top performance.

There is a challenge today around the the 'recruit and retain' ideology. Many of the brightest and best do not want career security in one company. They want skills portability and a number of jobs in different companies, often globally, and their focus is Me Inc. not Your Company Inc.

I recently heard a great strategy to recruit and retain that took account of Gen Y mobility. Many companies are letting talented people go with their best wishes and an open ended offer to come back when they feel the time is right. By all accounts this is working well for many big consultancies and global companies.

Another option is to give talented staff a slice of the action, whether via share ownership or profit sharing. This works well for some people but not for others.

I think one thing is clear, and that is that market dominance will change quickly as talented people move around to maiximise their personal gain. Companies will need strategic human resource management in place to meet this threat.

DK

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Start Small and Persist

Today on the Internet there is no shortage of people who will, supposedly, tell you how to make great profits, with no effort. My advice is to ignore them.

I suggest to people to join a great little program where you start off making a few cents a day and can grow to make a decent amount of dollars per day. The hardest thing about making a thousand dollars on the Net, is making the first dollar. The program allows you to make cash from clicking links, filling out offers and doing tasks. Not glamorous, maybe even a little bit boring, but I make money from spending less than 10 minutes a day on the site.

Over time I have got hundreds of others into this program and they are the source of the dollars compared to the cents I make by myself.

I can always tell who the success stories will be. They have two characteristics:

1. They take action, join up and make those first few cents on day one and then consistently earn daily afterwards

2. They sell on to others consistently.

So what is the program?

It is called Clixsense.

Take action and Join Now by clicking the link below:

http://www.clixsense.com/?2125710

When you have surfed for a month contact me and I will give you a surprise bonus.

Happy Earning

Liven up your Advertising (The Banshees are Screaming)

I am sure you have all seen the cringe worthy ads where the owner or his/her family do their own ads and they are awful, but make compelling viewing. Why ios this? WEll their amateurish or odd presentation grate on the nerves when one is used to well crafted ads from Madison Avenue. We tend to remember the best and the worst of a category and aggregate all the rest.

I am not encouraging you to write bad ad copy, but have some fun. I got a great response when I turned the photo of myself on my website upside down. Why? becauise it was different and people noticed the change and purchased the product.

The main thing is to get the buyers attention, not an easy feat these days.

Here are some fun ad titles:

Mrs Browns Jam gains a Cosmic audience

Pope Francis sells his donkey

These tires will last 5 miles - fantastic value

Have some fun and break out of the mould.

DK

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Persistent Messaging

One of the tenets of communication is that you need to consistently deliver and repeat your message. A consistent and regular message will get results. I have been advertising Click Track Profit since its inception and I have been using the same message over that time in the safelists I use. When I was told to do this, I was bewildered. Surely I should change meesage content to keep interest up? Well the experts say No, keep your message consistent. This does not work, however, if your message is junk in the first place.

I tried out my message using different headings and content to get the best result. Once I had the formula I kept using it.

So if you see a heading that says WARNING - Highly Addictive!, chances are that it is from me.

On a personal note, I have often taken action on an offer that I have seen hundreds of times. My rationale is that the person believes in their product and doesn't need to sell the next big thing.

So hang in there and be successful.

DK

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The iPad Mini is So Good

Just got my hands on an iPad Mini today to replace my iPad 3. I love it. It is much easier to carry around, is easy to hold and much lighter than the larger iPads.

Email is readable as are Office documents. Plus it has Siri and she understands my New Zealand English!

I am writing this blog while reclining on my bed. It is a very comfortable device to hold in one hand while typing with the other.

I give this little beauty a 5 star plus rating.

Is your Web Presence iPad Friendly?

If you, like me, love to adopt new technology, then you likely have an iPad or android tablet.

So have you noticed that many web pages and sites are not iPad friendly? I have and it annoys me increasingly. My iPad is fast becoming my business tool of choice and when I come across "clumsy" sites I tend to move on. And funnily enough it is some of the big players who are the biggest culprits.

So if you want to carry on your web business then I suggest an iPad friendly makeover. The consequences of not doing this will increase month by month.

Project Management - Be Bold and drop the contingency

I have spent today reviewing a portfolio of projects and was concerned to see that so many of them were bloated with contingent costs. I reminded my clients that such practices can sink a business. Because project work is risky in many cases, especially in my field of healthcare I T, a certain amount of time is added to the estimates to cover unknown events. Typically this is set at around 15% of the effort required.

The use of contingency is a prudent way to mitigate risk but it depends how and where you apply it. My preference is to add contingency over a program of work, containing many projects, rather than at a project or sub project level. However what often happens, and this can kill your business, is that at every line of the project plan people are building in contingent costs.

An example will illustrate the impact of this practice at the sub project, project and program level.

Let's take a 10 step project, which is one of ten similar projects comprising a program.

Costing contingency at step level where each step takes 10 days = 1.5 days contingency per step = 15 days contingency. Then apply 15% overall contingency = 15 days gives a total contingency of 30 days which actually equals 30% of the project days.

Costing contingency at a project level for a 100 day project = 15 days

Costing contingency at a program level for 10 projects of 100 days each using a conservative estimate that 50% of the projects will need to use the contingency and you get = 1000*15%*50%= 75 days. When this is cut back to project level this equals a contingency of 7.5 days.

When putting in a bid for business the difference between a 30 day contingency and a 7.5 day one is material. Say you cost time at $1000 per day then the quotes for the same work will differ by $22,500. This will often be the difference between getting a piece of work or losing it.

I advise my clients who are costing up projects to press staff to give estimates without contingency. Many people are cautious and will say 3 days rather than 2 days for some work, just in case. Reassure such staff that a contingency will be added but that you want a realistic estimation from them, the contingent liability is not their problem, but yours.

You may want to revisit some of your projects to look for unnecessary contingency. Your business may depend upon it.

Safelists for Sales

Safelists are marketing tools that allow you to send messages out to people who have opted in to receive them. Typically you read the mailings and get credits for doing so. You then use these credits to post your own mailings. Sounds simple and it is. But the interesting thing is that this technique works. I have been tracking my results for some time and I consistently get round a 3% response rate.

The secret is to keep posting in a consistent manner. Two big market players have just launched new Safelists. The Timtech guys have launched List Nerd and Matthew Graves, 100% profit mailer. Check them out on my website at http:// drkelp.co.uk by clicking on the respective banners. Good Luck.

Capitalize on the Laziness of Others

Today's take action tip is related to the use of traffic exchanges. Most traffic exchanges have what is called a Downline builder where you enter your referrals for other programs and exchanges. There are two facts about downline builders that you should know:

1. The vast majority of people don't fill in their information.

2. The people who do fill them in tend to join most of the programs on offer.

So what you may say?

Well here is how you can capitalize on these two facts by understanding a third fact:

3. Downline builders pass on referrals up the tree to the first person in the downline tree who has entered their details.

Action Point

Go to the programs you belong to, find the downline builder and enter your referral URLs and join the programs that you don't belong to then enter those referral URL's as well.

Result

You will start getting random referrals as the 5% in any downline who are active join the programs in the downline builder. The deeper the downline the more benefit you get.

My advice is to put all of your referral URLs into a spreadsheet as this makes it easier to fill out downline builders. When you join up any new traffic exchange fill in these details on Day 1.

I took sometime to follow my advice yesterday and got a referral at I Love Hits and Thumbvu for my efforts.

So the moral of the story is be active and you benefit from the laziness of others.

DK

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Family Business

My daughter is setting up her own business as a photographer and an associated social networking site. I have been invited to be a site admin but I am forbidden from posting anything lol.

Will give more details later.

I am a great believer in setting up your own company. You do the work and you get the profits, not some employer or shareholder.

My oldest daughter already has 2 successful and profitable businesses.

I will post more details later.

Leverage on your Skills

Do you have a good idea of your personal skill inventory?

Many people see themselves as being say a plumber, doctor etc instead as a holder of a set of skills.

One boss I had said two things to me that have stuck.

1. Consider yourself as your own corporation, Me Inc. Don't rely on a company or corporation to set your destiny.

2. Always look for new skills or tools to put in your toolbox. Each skill you have makes you more valuable. Top craftsman have a lot of tools to use.

Think about how your skills fit together to make a compelling package. Break out of the occupation mould.

My own career journey has been rich and along the way I filled my own toolbox with very valuable tools such as facilitation, change management, transformational leadership and benefits realisation management. What I am doing now is far removed but still sharing skills with what I started doing. Using the same set of skills you can build a lot of different combinations, think Lego here.

You can do it!

Project Management - Delusional Optimism

"we over-emphasize projects' potential benefits and underestimate likely costs, spinning success scenarios while ignoring the possibility of mistakes."

Kahneman & Lewis

Those of us who work in the project management field know the struggle of getting accurate business cases and project plans approved. To get projects initiated the tempation is to overestimate benefits and underestimate costs. Project plans are written that reflect a world where the sky is blue, there is no rain and the birds are singing. Unfortunately in the real world such conditions rarely last long enough to see the project through and we are left with rising costs and declining benefits.

From long experience I know that projects over run for a number of legitimate reasons and these are not usually apparent at the initiation stage of the project. Given you are spending your own or someone elses money you need to be diligent to presnt a realistic cost-benefit situation. This may not be popular at the approval stage but when you do the post-implementation review you will be able to show that you completed (usually :)) within your project contingency.

DK

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A Fool with a Tool is still a Fool

Tools without training and business savvy can be of no value. Skilled craftspeople know their craft and the tools of the trade. Shiny new widgets or programs are usually not what is required. That is why I strongly recommend Click Track Profit. It is a free, video training that starts you right at the beginning, tells you about the fundamentals of online business and slowly adds the tools as you progress and are ready to apply them.

Check it out from my homepage http://drkelp.co.uk

How is your Google+ Rank

I have just found a site that allows you to see where you rank on Google Plus (Google+). For your information I am only 83040 places below Lady GaGa who is at the top.

Go to Social Statistics to get your ranking then post it the comments section. How popular are you really?

I am working to get below 80,000th.

Cheers

Grant

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Give Realistic Timelines

The temptation in business is to promise delivery to the clients timeline when you already know you can't deliver in time. By taking on such work you slow up delivery for all of your clients over time not just the current one.

When your client is reporting up to a Board of government agency you run the risk of getting them into trouble for non delivery. This is not a good place for all involved.

Solution
1. If you can't do the work on time tell the client straight away
2. Tell the client a realistic date - they may be maybe able to work with an amended date.

Being ethical in this way will increase customer confidence in yourself and your business.

DK

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Lukewarm never works

Business, or successful business is never carried out by lukewarm people. You have to be hot and incandescent to make a difference. Aggression in business is necessary but it doesn't equate to nastiness.

Every day I am thinking about what I can do to make my online business better. This takes me down many dead alleys but also opens up some surprising vistas.

I particularly enjoy watching TED videos that stretch my mind in new directions. If you have not seen any of these clips then click here.

Enjoy your weekend and DON'T be LUKEWARM...

Ciao

DK

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Tools to get Blog Traffic

If like most of us bloggers you are looking for more eyes to your blog try this new tool called BlogClicker. You view others blogs and in return others visit your blog.

Join Here if you are interested in getting more blogs viewers.

DK

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Keeping your Edge

To do well in business you need to have an edge. This means you need to be active and awake. Naturally curious people make great business people because they take an interest in the world around them. They are always on the look out for new experiences and trends.

Edge doesn't always come from concentrating on business topics. Truly transformational breakthroughs come at the interfaces between different groupings. Between science and the arts, religion and business, technology and craft. Don't be afraid to extend the boundaries of your knowledge. Who knows what you will find.

DK

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The Advantage of being a Small Business

WE are hear about the big companies in the media but it is small businesses that drive the economy. So use your smallness to your advantage.

The biggest advantage of being small is that you can be fleet of foot. Agility is important in todays ever changing business world. When a new trend starts growing legs it is easier if you are small and nimble to change direction and leverage on first mover advantage.

Most of the innovation that we see from big companies comes from their purchase of smaller, innovative companies with ideas. When you are large physically you don't move as quickly as some one who is small and agile (think energetic children here).

Just remember Small is Beautiful and can be very Profitable as well.

DK

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Will your Business Survive?

Will my business survive? This is a question that we all need to keep asking ourselves. Don't take the survival of your business for granted. In these times discontinuous changes can wipe out whole business sectors very quickly. I will use an illustration from the 1870's to illustrate this, and to show that this is not a new problem for business owners.

If you had asked a blacksmith in 1870 whether his business would survive, he would have answered, "Of couse it will, blacksmiths have been in business for centuries immemorial". Yet with the advent of the automobile the business of the blacksmith was smitten. An honorable trade that had been in existence for a very long time, faced extinction. The number of blacksmiths today is a very small percentage of the numbers in 1870.

I grew up in a pre-computer world and when I was first at college we did our advanced programming using punch cards. In the last 40 years we have had the advent of the personal computer, the iPod, iPhone and now iPad along with the Internet followed by the world wide web and social networking. My children do not understand a world without Google, Netflix and iTunes.

But the world of the web, and web business is in constant evolution. Don't have an "1870 blacksmith" attitude but keep your eyes open for trends that may affect your business and be prepared to change quickly.


DK

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Respond to Your Customers

With online business you obviously don't have your customer standing in front of you. Physical proximity allows you to respond to the customers queries and body language.

So how do you respond to customers online? There are different ways to do this. Some of these are listed below:

Email

Safelist

Telephone

Skype - a real winner

Personal Mailing to your list

Chat channels on the traffic exchanges

The main thing is to acknowledge your customer. This is particularly important when you get new referrals into your programs. I have thousands in my downlines but I still make the effort to contact new referrals. You may ask why? Well the main reason is to show that you care. It doesn't need to be an epistle but just a

Hi X,
I see you have joined my program. I am your sponsor and would like to give you any assistance you require.
Your name.

Trust me if you do this, you will see results. Satisfied and cared for customers refer others and also repeat purchase.

Have a great weekend.

DK

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Oak Trees take time to Grow

My daughter like many other people aspires to be a multi millionaire and the CEO of her own company. A great aspiration but when pressed to outline the actions being taken to get there I get no robust response. As they say a Goal is a dream with a deadline. Without a plan, the dream remains a dream.

The Internet is full of offers to make millions without effort and so many people pay money without doing due diligence.

Here are some hints on success

1. There is no free lunch

2. If it seems to be good to be true, stay away

3. The harder you work the more success you have

4. Success requires focus

5. Many people who look successful are not - the rich looking are often riddles with debt (Check out The Millionaire Mind - an excellent book).

Make a plan and stick to it. Focus on your business strengths.

Just remember might oaks from tiny acorns grow - it just takes time.

Good Luck with nurturing your business Oak.

DK

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Make time for play

Playing for 30 minutes a day is an anodyne for the business person. Play relieves stress and helps to clear the mind. Creativity and play are closely linked so schedule some play time into your schedule. I often use this time to play music, do some relaxation or day dream. As the old saying goes, "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy".

Focus and Never Give up

It pays to apply focus and persistence to all of your online business endeavours. Don't jump from program to program looking for the next big thing. Do your research and stick with the program you decide has most benefit. For the past year my focus has been on Click Track Profit and the more effort I put in the better the results (for details click on the Dr Kelps Programs that Pay in my signature link.

A good example is the use of safelists. Many people do one post to 3000 people and then sit back waiting for the cash to come rolling in. Wrong approach. Industry figures show that 2% of people will respond to a safelist posting. So you don't have 3000 sets of eyes seeing your post but only 60. Answer - send out consistently on safelists, day in, day out. Believe me this does work it just needs tenancity and a good level of bloody mindedness.

Good luck and hang in there. Check out the Top Tools tabe on http://drkelp.co.uk to see the top safelist I use.


DK

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In season and out of season

I am borrowing a biblical quote today for my heading and post as it is relevant. The quote relates to preaching the gospel but is equally applicable to your business pursuits. The meaning is that you need to keep working when you are getting results and when you are not. Persistence and consistency are top business attributes.

It has been my experience hat sales come in cycles, but if you don't keep working in the down times then the sales dry up altogether.

This is particularly applicable to traffic exchange surfing and safe list posting.

Hang in there and succeed.

Learn or hone a skill daily

Business success, like medical diagnostic success, is based on science + art. Experimentation also advances business and medical research. Set aside some time every day to look at acquiring a new skill or honing an old one. Today I did a video from Click Track Profit about list building. It was a great start in this area. I also designed a new banner for my website and I'm tracking hits from it. These 2 things took less than 15 minutes but gave me food for thought to consider all day.

Don't rest on previous success or regret past mistakes. Keep moving and learning.

I worked with an inspirational researcher who at the age of 94 got a 5 year research grant to look at big data. He looks 60 and his mind is razor sharp, so don't let your age hinder you from achievement.

We all need mentors

When first starting your business online it is important to have a mentor or mentors who will guide you through the start up stage and beyond. Mentors can provide support and help you to avoid the common errors that newbies tend to make. I have been lucky to have had a number of people who have provided advice and encouragement. Some of those that come to mind are Dan Moses, David Riley, Randy Ritter, John Olson and Tim Linden. In some cases this has been by direct contact but more often it has been by reading their newsletters and following their advice.

In the last year I have been a member of Click Track Profit (CTP) and this program is excellent if you are wanting step by step, video instruction from the market leaders. I have built a residual income there from following the program. This is the best program that I have ever ever belonged to.


DK

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Mega trend 3 - Big Data

The third big trend is big data. A definition of big data with a business focus is given below by
Phil Mui, Chief Product and Engineering Officer, Acxiom

“The world has always had ‘big’ data. What makes ‘big data’ the catch phrase of 2012 is not simply about the size of the data. ’Big data’ also refers to the size of available data for analysis, as well as the access methods and manipulation technologies to make sense of the data. For many, ‘Big Table’, ‘Map Reduce’, ‘Hadoop’, ‘No Sql’, among other such technologies are strongly correlated, and often used interchangeably, with ‘big data’. The adoption of these tools and techniques enables one to make sense of the volume, velocity, and variety of big data.

For marketers, ‘big data’ represents a challenge and an opportunity to develop intelligent analytical tools to better reach their customers at the right channel, right time, and right device. Big data promises significant payoffs: it enables marketers to invest proportionally to the value of existing or potential customer relationships, often in real-time. More importantly, big data promotes a culture of data-informed decision making. It is now much harder to justify a decision based solely on ‘intuition’ or ‘gut’ without some data analysis to back it up. If it takes a hyped term to make data-driven decision making pervasive, I am all for it.”

So as we head into 2013 we will see tools becoming available that can assist us to tap into new and exciting market niches armed with massive amounts of data. This will make the data mining currently used by Apple Google and Amazon seem elementary.

So keep an eye on the three mega trends and consider how you can meet the market.