Speedy Gambling

WOW! What a rush it is to ride the white line on a California highway. It is like living on the edge of danger. You might not know that California has an interesting vehicle law that allows motorcycles to ride between traffic. Yes, between traffic lanes, on the painted white line that separates traffic.

Last week it was a typical California day. I was on my motorcycle in heavy traffic wearing protective gear such as a leather jacket, full face helmet with boots. The speedometer is wavering at 10 miles per hour and in 90 degree’s it was HOT! Realizing that my destination was another 30 miles away, baking on asphalt really lacked appeal. The motivation of getting out of this situation led me to follow a passing biker who seemed to part the narrow traffic gap like Moses parted the seas.

As I carefully maneuvered through the traffic riding the white line, my confidence grew. My eyes bounced around like radar as the large SUV’s and 18 wheelers seemed to appear larger than actual size. I felt like a ballet dancer on a tight rope gliding through a narrow tunnel. My eyes were fixed on the opening between cars, not on the obstacles. This is an important aspect of performing this motorcycle challenge. I knew that if I looked at the vehicles, the bike would steer towards them because that is how anyone steers a motorcycle. We are taught from the beginning to look where we are going and the bike will follow. Sure, there is leaning involved but overall it is where the eyes look that move the bike in the direction it will travel. It is the same with outside sales too.

When we stay focused on our destination we will reach it. Don’t look at or focus on the obstacle, look toward the openings around it. We can be bold enough to suggest that if we look for price objections, they will show up. The opening we are referring to here is the opportunity we have for solving a customer’s problem. Sales opportunities should always be our focus – solving customer problems.

As I moved and danced through the tunnel of vehicles It was like making small goals of gliding past one set of vehicles and then to the next. When an obstacle appeared to shift into my travel path adjustments were quickly made. However, the vision of an opening never escaped my view. From time to time I would have to apply the brakes but that was only temporary. Eventually the road opened up and I was able to reach my goal.

I use this example because it is very relevant to what we go through in outside sales each day. If we set a goal of making 20 contacts in a day and 120 per week, we must remain focused on the goal. There will always be things that try to get in our way. We might have to apply our brakes temporarily but we must move forward toward our goal. We can use this example for mailings, telephone calls, writing thank you notes and just about anything. The important thing is to stay focused on the destination and look for the openings. The obstacles will always try to get in our path. We must learn to make adjustments and maneuver away from.

Setting Priority Goals
We can improve our chances of reaching the goals we set if we set visual reminders. Let’s say that we set a goal of making 20 contacts each day. If we created a large visible reminder or small reminder cards and posted them in areas we can see from our work area, in our car, near the telephone, desk drawer and on the wall we will remember our goals. More importantly, we will either reach or exceed it. These reminders will help us look for the openings in the day instead of the obstacles. Now, go out and have a great day. Oh, and just so you know, I don’t make it a habit of riding on Los Angeles Freeways, particularly riding on the white line. My preference is the slower paced mountain pass or back roads it is safer and more scenic

Steve Martinez is the Founder of Selling Magic a strategic business development consulting company. The company specializes in Automated Sales Process Management (ASPM) which increases sales through technology and automation of the best practices of sales. You can reach Steve at http://www.sellingmagic.com

Are you worried about your sales slumping? Are your first quarter numbers looking lower? Is your pipeline looking softer than you’d like it to be at this point even though the economy is strong? Here’s an idea that you can use to quickly pump up your sales. Its’ called the 90 day sales blitz. The whole premise behind this is to rally the whole company around doing everything it can to support the sales team to close deals, expand the pipeline, get more opportunities into the forecast, and close deals that have been out there languishing for some time. Create a sales turn around plan with your team by pulling together everybody from sales, marketing, and operations and figuring out where’s the low hanging fruit in the short term that we can go pick in order to bump our sales numbers up in the right direction. Where are our best opportunities that can close the fastest, what can we do to create more opportunities quickly through lead generation? How do we do direct mail or outbound telemarketing campaigns into our prospecting list? How can we create a compelling offer that we’d put on our website so that visitors who come through and find us from keyword searches decide that they want to convert and become quick sales leads that can be closed faster. What can they do to incentivize those that are searching for my products and services to call in immediately and speak to a sales rep? What sort of premiums and bonuses can I give to them to quickly bring me new sales opportunities?

So a good 90 day sales blitz starts by getting all of your people together, sitting down and figuring out, how can we, as a team, pull a rabbit out of our hat by bringing together all of the best knowledge and experience and all of the company’s energy and harnessing it towards making short term sales.

A number of ideas that we’ve seen over the years include short term sales contests and sales bonuses to people who are in marketing for generating the most leads. Also: customer bonuses for bringing in new referrals and doing option upgrades or doing cross sales or up sales. These are all the kinds of things that you can do to create some short term enthusiasm and rally all of your resources in your company around greatly increasing your numbers. So if you need to do something in the short term to stimulate sales, think about a 90 sales blitz. If you’re like many companies out there that have practiced this behavior in the past, you’ll find that with the right leadership, the right enthusiasm, the right incentives, involvement of all of the people in your company, you can really move mountains.

About Cube Management:
Cube Management provides sales acceleration services to emerging growth and mid-market companies in the technology, manufacturing, healthcare and business service sectors. The experts at Cube Management work across the entire spectrum of marketing, sales and business development to provide customized solutions that drive revenue and profit growth. Cube Management combines Strategy, Process & People to produce winning results.

Do you want to sell your golf cart? If so then you will need to discover how much it is worth so that you can get a good price and also improve your probabilty of a sale.

Finding the value of your golf cart is a great help as it provides you to price your cart in line with market prices and provides an indication of how much a someone is willing to pay.

There are many methods to discover how much your golf cart is worth, however the tip I’m about to share with you is by far the easiest and most accurate method.

Instead of comparing your golf cart at dealerships and asking hundreds of dealers how much they will buy it for, an alternative method to make a private sale as you get to set the price yourself which increases the chance of higher sale price.

To find out how much you should list your vehicle for, all you need to do is go to ebay.com and input the exact model of your golf cart and click search. A variety of similar carts will appear with prices next to them. These prices are set by buyers but we can tell they are acceptable to the buyer by looking at how many bids each auction has.

So for example, if an auction is selling an RXV golf cart for $1000 but has no bids and there is another selling it for $800 with 3 bids we can assume we are more likely to get a buyer at $800. I would also recommend looking at completed auctions to get an idea of the prices that the cart has sold for in the past.

There are many places where you can list your golf cart for sale including online auctions and classified ads sites. Find out more and get more tips at golf carts guide

Shopping is something most people love. But often the thrill, excitement, and absorption becomes such that an ordinary hobby or time filler becomes an addiction. A shopping addiction like drugs, alcohol, or gambling is a blinding thirst where the shopper is unable to see essential from non essential and over spend. They shop until they drop and run into debt spending on their credit cards up to and over its limit.

Shopping for many is escapism from the realities of life and its accompanying problems. It is but a temporary reprieve from depression, anxiety, or loneliness. What a shopper never understands is it is a false world which will not grant happiness or love, or self esteem. After the shopping binge the person will experience remorse. The unhappiness will intensify due to unmanageable financial disaster and debt. This will be further compounded by the displeasure earned from family members or financial consultants. Believe me over 80% of the purchases will never be used. An addict may have a hundred pairs of shoes, or bags, or coast, or glasses – the obsession being restricted to one kind of object.

Like alcoholics, compulsive shoppers go on binges when they are upset, lonely, depressed, or feeling out of sorts. Shopping is a “pick me up,” a temporary euphoria that lifts their spirits.

The possible repair of finances and cure of the addiction is possible only if the shopper accepts that an addiction exists. What helps is professional counseling and joining a self-healing group that is dealing with this addiction. A shopping addicts version or equivalent of alcoholics anonymous.

Guidelines:

1. First and foremost set small limits on all credit cards. Freezing the limits will help you limit your spending power.

2. Lock away all credit and debit cards.

3. Budget household and other expenses. Make specific envelopes and mark them clearly for what the money is earmarked for.

4. Sit with a family member or friend and make a list of bare essentials. Go shopping with a controlling companion one who will say “NO” is no uncertain terms.

5. Never visit sales or discount warehouses. Or, watch television shopping channels.

6. Do not subscribe to shopping catalogues.

7. Fill your day choc-a-bloc with activities. If you have no time to ’stand and stare’ you won’t have a moment to think about shopping. Find interesting activities that absorb your interests and time.

8. Go to the mall or shopper’s paradise after they are all safely closed for the day. This way you can look at displays without being tempted to rush in and buy something.

9. If you feel the itch or urge to shop, resist it with all your strength and go out for a walk or to the gym exercise until you are too tired to do anything else.

10. Pay for all purchases by cash or cheque. Use a card only in emergencies.

Compulsive shopping is a serious addiction. It is escapism from realities and unhappiness. As serious as drug addictions and an illness, a compulsive shopper needs treatment that is similar to other addictions. Addictions of any kind need to be snipped at the very root before it reaches a point of no return.

Mortgage Loan Officer Training: 10 Helpful Tips That Can Instantly Boost Your Income By $5,000 Per Month

Well here they are… 10 mortgage loan officer training tips to improve efficiency and increase revenue. These tips have made me hundreds of thousands of dollars over the years and I’m confident they will do the same for you:

Mortgage Loan Officer Training Tip #1: Only use a few lenders Depending on your niche, all you really need is a few good lenders. With a portfolio of about five lenders, you can handle all credit grades and even special programs like stated, no doc and 100% financing.

Mortgage Loan Officer Training Tip #2: Read your lender’s guidelines to build an intimate knowledge of their products and procedures – THIS IS A MUST!!! (And easy to do if you only use a few lenders.) Don’t rely on lender reps to tell you about their guidelines. They are human and can make mistakes just like the rest of us.

Mortgage Loan Officer Training Tip #3: Send gifts to your appraiser, title agents, and underwriters to gain favor. This is a great way to build relationships with the people you rely on to do business. Look for a reason to send these people a thank you card along with a gift. This is another good reason to use only a few good lenders.

Mortgage Loan Officer Training Tip #4: Define your market What loans will you do and what loans will you not touch? You can and will cause yourself undue heartache if you agree to take a loan that is outside of your market. For instance, I refused to even look at a loan unless the borrowers had a credit score of 580 or higher. If an applicant has a credit score less than 580, I referred them to my loan officer partner and split the commissions.

Mortgage Loan Officer Training Tip #5: Specialize Find a niche. Specialists always make more than generalists. Everyone does purchase loans on single family houses. What if you became the expert in your area on financing investment properties, construction loans, or VA loans? With some work and dedication you could become the mortgage lending “guru” for your niche and monopolize your marketplace.

Mortgage Loan Officer Training Tip #6: Location, location, location If you can: Keep a frig in your office, place a copier close to your assistant’s desk, and have your computer printer right next to your desk. This will save loads of time walking around the office. It will also keep your assistants focused. Sometimes it’s hard to walk through an office without falling into several casual conversations that can lower your team’s production.

Mortgage Loan Officer Training Tip #7: Get all documentation up front I believe in getting every piece of documentation I could possibly need right up front. That way if a problem arises you have a greater chance of being able to fix the problem on your own without bothering the borrowers.

Mortgage Loan Officer Training Tip #8: Only the necessities Just because you collect extra documentation, doesn’t mean you have to use it. Don’t submit extra paperwork to your processor or to underwriting. It could open a can of worms you don’t want opened. Only turn in exactly what’s need to fund the loan – nothing more or less.

Mortgage Loan Officer Training Tip #9: Sandwich technique At some point you’ll need to contact a borrower during the loan process and ask for more information. When this situation arises, try using the sandwich technique:

Re-establish rapport Make your request: “Oh by the way I need___. When can you fax it to me?” Continue rapport building dialog. Say goodbye and politely get off the phone

If you have a difficult borrower, this works like a charm to diminish their anxiety level.

Mortgage Loan Officer Training Tip #10: Testimonials Get testimonials from everyone. They are great marketing tools for your business. Use them to target your client’s CPA, HR manager at work, real estate agent and financial planner to establish a referral relationship.

There you have it. Incorporate these ideas into your mortgage business and see how they impact your bottom line.

By the way, if you would like to get another 13 mortgage loan officer training tips that can instantly boost your income by $5,000 per month, visit:

www.Mortgage-Leads-Generator.com/a/13tips.htm

Please feel free to reprint this article as long as the resource box is left intact and all links are hyperlinked.

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Hartley Pinn has recently created the “Mortgage Leads Generator” Training Course to teach mortgage loan officers 10 proven strategies for generating more than 71 mortgage leads per day.

Chamonix Haute Savoie is a stunning place with the impressive Mont Blanc and majestic glaciers. Everyone love to go paragliding or even visiting the Aiguille du Midi. I normally get a flight from Fulton and stay at a Chamonix hotel for the duration of my stay.

My family and I used to went to Ramada Limited Galveston unfortunately it never matched its its advert: The Ramada Limited Galveston offers affordable beachfront accommodations approximately five miles from Ellington Field Airport and about 45 miles from Houston Hobby Airport. The property’s amenities include a complimentary continental breakfast and coffee, outdoor pool (seasonal), interior corridors, free weekday newspapers, safe deposit box, and free parking. Standard room amenities include air-conditioning, cable TV, and telephone. Note: There must be one guest 21 or older in each room.

However in Chamonix Mont Blanc the catered chalet is always outstanding. Also eating out in our groups number one restaurant, Gemini Tavern, scoffing four-layer oreo brownies is a treat. Chamonix Mont Blanc is a large enough destination to insure that there is lots of things for the snowboarder to do. Amongst other things it includes a husky sledding centre and a shopping arcade of designer boutiques, Chamonix offers a combination of snowboarding, old town charm and shopping which not many ski resorts can hope to rival.

I buy a lot of books online. So many, in fact, that I built my own website (Booku.com) which searches the big online stores and locates the best prices for me. It’s nothing fancy, but it does the trick.

The other day, I received an inquiry from someone representing another online book retailer, requesting that I add their store to my roster. So I checked them out.

My first impression was, “Ah, yes, I remember them”. I had been there before but had departed after several seconds, without venturing past the home page. I couldn’t remember why. I investigated, and here’s what I discovered this time:

On the top left, there’s a button that says “Save on Christian Books, Music, and Bibles”. The top right says something about “Desecration”. I also noticed the word “FaithPoint” mentioned a few times.

After a quick view of the site I jumped to this conclusion: It’s a bookstore specializing in Christian books and religious products. Perfect, if only I had a hankering for, let’s say, an audio version of the Bible on CD.

But, upon further investigation, I discovered something fantastic:

They actually had a great inventory of all kinds of books – not just religious titles. New books, used books, and hard-to-find books. (Who would have known? Why did they hide it? Did they even KNOW they were hiding it?) But, here’s the kicker…

Every title I searched was at least 10% cheaper than could be found at Amazon.com (you get the extra discount when you purchase a $5 membership – but I think it’s worth it.) In addition, they had titles I had previously searched at Amazon, but couldn’t find. They even offered something I have yet to see online: the ability to order individual issues of magazines (not just subscriptions).

I decided to go shopping.

After filling up my cart with five magazines and a wee tiny book, I was a bit surprised to see the total price considerably higher than I expected. When I got to the bottom of the list, I saw the shipping charge for UPS ground service (3-7 business days – ugh) was almost ten bucks ($3.25 plus $.99 per item). For what? A few magazines and a book? These items would probably fit in a USPS flat rate envelope for three and change.

At about this time, I could hear the voices in my head (no, not THOSE voices) screaming: “Abandon cart! Abandon cart!”

Which is just what I did.

This isn’t just a silly little story about me being a cheapskate. There’s more. If you sell anything online that has to be shipped, pay close attention here…

“Shipping And Handling Charges Deter 63 Percent Of Consumers >From Buying Online…”

“…Survey reveals that 73 percent of consumers evaluate the total price of products, including S&H, before making an online purchase.”

“…Companies that are profiting on S&H run the risk of increasing distrust among consumers.”

“New research indicates that weight-based shipping and handling costs will minimize merchants’ and consumers’ risks”

[Source: Jupiter Media Metrix Press Release - go read it: Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off