Act On Tips

Essential to your success as an effective, engaging communicator is learning not only what to say, but what not to say. The following guide examines several sentences, phrases and questions that stand in your way of connecting and communicating with confidence.

Do you remember me?
If you walk up to someone and the first words out of your mouth are, “Do you remember me?” I guarantee you will a) make them feel uncomfortable, b) pressure them into giving an answer, and c) cause them to lose face when they regretfully tell you they can’t seem to remember who you are.

Some people are good with names; others are good with faces; while others can’t seem to recall a single person they’ve ever met in their lives. But no matter what type of memory a person has, “forgetting someone” is one of the most embarrassing feelings anyone can experience - especially if they’ve met you several times before.

Therefore, if you know someone doesn’t remember you, rescue them. Just tell them who you are. Odds are, deep down they’ll be signing, “Oh thank God he told me his name - I didn’t want to ask!”

SUCCESS SENTENCE #1: “Hi! I’m Scott with Front Porch Productions - we met last month at the Chamber Meeting when Carol introduced us.”

Here’s my card…
The rule of business cards is: don’t give it to anyone who doesn’t ask for it. It’s presumptuous. Sadly, the exchange of business cards is a ritual that our culture has de-formalized over the past 20 years. On the other hand, some high-context cultures like the Japanese view this as a sacred business ritual.

For conversational effectiveness, don’t assume that somebody wants your card. Think about it: how many times has someone given you one of their cards - without asking - to which you thought to yourself, “Okay…and what do you want me to do with this?”

SUCCESS SENTENCE #2: “May I give you one of my cards?”

So…what do YOU do?
According to CNN.com, the US rate of unemployment in September of 2004 was somewhere between five and six percent. Unfortunately, those are just the reported cases. So don’t overlook the possibility that the person you’re talking to is unemployed, was recently fired or is in the process of finding a new job.

Asking someone “So…what do YOU do?” is an assumption. And if you utter this phrase, it may necessitate a shoehorn the size of Shaquille O’Neal to get your foot out of your mouth. Instead, ask less specific, yet open ended questions that empower an engaging response.

SUCCESS SENTENCE #3: “How do you spend most of your time during the week?”

Can you believe the weather?
I’ve read almost every book on starting conversations, mingling, breaking the ice, networking and meeting people - and I have yet to find one that doesn’t say:

“Talking about the weather is always a good way to start a conversation.”

No it isn’t. It’s a terrible way. And just because everyone uses it doesn’t make it effective. Starting a conversation about the weather means you’ve settled for starting a conversation about the weather! This makes your conversation partner feel like you’ve settled for them too. And every time you do it, you show the other person that you aren’t a good enough conversationalist to talk about anything other than the weather.

But I have faith in you. You can do better than that.

SUCCESS SENTENCE #4: “What was the best part about your weekend?”

Are you a new member?
There’s only one feeling worse that forgetting someone: devaluing someone. In your organization, club, business or association - there are bound to be dozens, possibly even hundreds of members you’ve never met. That’s okay. You can’t keep a tab on everybody. People come in and out of organizations all the time, and not everyone comes to every meeting.

So don’t assume that someone is a newbie simply because you don’t know them. Even if you think “Oh, I know everybody,” there are always people on the fringes. Perhaps they joined the organization five years ago. Maybe they’ve been out of town for a few months or their schedule conflicts with certain meetings or events.

SUCCESS SENTENCE #5: “I don’t believe we’ve met before - my name’s Scott.”

Combating Conversational Crappiness
Some people don’t think before they speak, and the price to pay is at the expense of their partner’s conversational comfort. But if you avoid these five communication barriers, you will be certain to make the other person you’re engaging with feel welcome and valued.

© 2005 All Rights Reserved.

Scott Ginsberg is a professional speaker, “The World’s Foremost Expert on Nametags” and the author of HELLO my name is Scott and The Power of Approachability. He helps people MAXIMIZE their approachability and become UNFORGETTABLE communicators - one conversation at a time. For more information contact Front Porch Productions at http://www.hellomynameisscott.com.

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The Internet is growing at an exponential rate, resulting from greater masses attempting to earn an income from the Computer Revolution. It doesn’t take long for a developer to realize the magnitude of increasing competition, when attempting to obtain more visitors. How much competition exists? The fact is, when this article was written, “Whois,” reported 65,443,044 active Domains existed. Additionally, 446,308 Domains where, “on-hold,” and 1,184,180 Domains where created by 18:00 EST (1). While this information does not illustrate direct competition for a given niche, it’s apparent that any type of Website created will have modest rivalry.

The Business model of an Internet Website is relatively simple; increasing traffic means increasing revenue. However, with the growing number of Websites, it will become more difficult to obtain greater traffic. So how is traffic disbursed on the Internet? Traffic disbursement can be isolated to two primary sources: Search Engine Queries and Incoming links.

Search Engines have evolved greatly in the past few years. However, the principal is still the same. A Search Engine Spider travels through virtual space analyzing Webpages’ encountered and assessing their premise. Spiders can quickly route through deeply routed pages within any given Website and index them within a Database. In addition, they can assess which Websites change frequently, and retrieve new data on a scheduled basis. Because of their ability to quickly assess pages and their changes, they offer the internet community one of the most valuable resources, “The ability to accurately locate documents of interest”.

Based on the fundamentals of Search Engine’s, developer’s can increase Search Engine traffic by offering more content and resources. As relevant pages and resources are added to a Website, the premise of the Website becomes more apparent. In addition, expanded queries will match relevant pages displaying new content.

The other source of Internet Traffic, “incoming links,” can benefit a developer in several ways. First and most obvious, we can achieve greater traffic from the visitor of Websites displaying the incoming links. Also, if used properly, incoming links that are text based (Anchor Text) help Search Engine Spiders determine the premise of a Web-page. Finally, the total number of incoming links improves rapport with Search Engines (2).

Because some Search Engines poses the tools and resources to quickly archive numerous pages and their data, they have begun to utilize, “Anchor Text,” to leverage their Search Engine Results. The most famous example, of this technology being implemented, is the Apple QuickTime Download page showing as number one in Google for a search query of, “Click Here”. The term, “Click Here,” cannot be found anywhere on the visible page or Source Code. So why is it number one? Because the Developer linked the words, “Click Here,” to the download page from many pages with good rapport (High Google PR). Naturally, this is pure speculation, as only the Google Engineers could explain exactly why it is number one accurately. However, most are probably familiar with the famous Google Bomb of, “Miserable Failure”. A large number of people linked, “Miserable Failure,” to the Official White House Web-page of President George W. Bush. As a result, George ranks number one on Google for the search term.

Text links can be acquired through paying for placement or through exchanges with other Webmasters. For the most part, paid links will generate a lot more traffic then exchange links. This is due solely to placement. In a typical link exchange, the incoming links are placed on, “Weak,” pages that receive little traffic. In contrast, advertised links will be presented on prominent pages with a lot of visitors. Moreover, a lot of speculation exists regarding how the major three Search Engines treat reciprocal links. Some believe they cancel-out one another, as a vote. This speculation suggests that, “one-way,” incoming links provide the greatest benefit.

Bombing, as illustrated in the above examples, has created a large market for the purchase of Text Links. As a matter of fact, text link advertising is soaring right now. A number of people now offer broker services, connecting text link publishers with people wishing to advertise. It has gotten so big the Major search engines are beginning to demonstrate concern. Matt Cutts, a developer for Google, has offered some insight on the matter (3). Acknowledging that many Websites rely on the sale of ad space for income, he explains how this method of calculating the premise of a page has greatly improved Search Results for all the major Search Engines, and selling links hurts this technology.

Matt suggests that sold links should include an additional tag, “rel=nofollow,” to tell Spiders not to count the vote. The Consequences of not including the tag means that Google may not pass PageRank with links coming from the site selling the links. Essentially, purchased links that do not include that tag will eventually become worthless for Search Engine recognition.

Outside of paid advertising, it would require something really special to acquire incoming links. With practical reasoning, a developer would have to either create something very useful to the Internet community, or offer valuable information that will be referenced by others often. What ever method is conjured, it’s obvious in this point of time, the text link prevails for traffic generation.

(1)Whois Source: Detailed Domain Counts and Internet Statistic (http://www.whois.sc/internet-statistics/).

(2)Google: Google Technology (http://www.google.com/technology/).

(3) Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO: Text Links and PageRank (http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/text-links-and-pagerank/).

Michael Medeiros is the developer of Mjmls. Michael has an extensive background in Business and Advertising. He offers Internet Advertising Solutions through free classifieds, a Website Directory, and Text Advertising Programs.

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If you are one of the many people this Christmas season who have absolutely no idea what to buy for the people in your life that won’t end up returned after Christmas, this is the article for you. It would be a great idea to get them a gift card and let them choose what they really want and then you can spend the rest of the day enjoying each others company.

Each year Holiday spending gets more and more excessive. Even though people always claim they’ll do it differently in the future, each Christmas it feels like you spend the holiday just cleaning and cramming stuff away. Sure it was fun to get gifts when we were kids; but now that we’re adults do we need to continue the crazy mall shopping every year?

The obstacle occurs,because everyone has different tastes. The theory seems to be that if you just buy a lot of stuff for a person you will please them because you increased the odds. If you really want to go all out for someone, then do some research first. You need to get opinions from people who are sure of what they are looking for. Ask the person a few probing questions throughout the year so when gift time comes you will have something to go on. This will hopefully stop you from buying those useless gadgets and trinkets. Gift cards are always an option, when every other idea seems likely to fail. You can personalize these with a few home-baked cookies or ornaments, or with a personalized card that lets them know that you wanted them to have the last say about their gift. The point is that spending all day surrounded by presents is no match for the gift of family and friends being together.

A lot of people feel that gift cards are not personal, but of you think about it, you realize that giving a friend something he or she doesnt like or need is not personal either. Gift cards are a terrific last-minute idea if your inquiries didn’t result in any answers. For the most part people either don’t know what they want, or they don’t know how to express it. There are plenty of ways to please this group, too. Here is a great site for some unique gift ideas for everyone.

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What the Heck is RSS and How Will it Help Me?

RSS, RSS, RSS… you hear the constant chant, but who really
knows what the heck RSS means?

Although it originated in 1997, most folks still don’t know how
RSS works, and want to know ‘What is RSS?’ and ‘How will it help
me?’

I had only a very cursory understanding of RSS until last week,
yet when trusted colleagues start telling me that it’s an
effective way to get traffic to your site, it was time to learn
more.

So what is RSS?

RSS stands for ‘Real Simple Sydication’ and is a way for you to
publish (or ‘feed’) ‘what’s new’ information about your site. A
single item will typically include a headline, a snippet of
content and a link to your site.

Using an RSS feed reader, anyone who has subscribed to your
feed, will be notified when you publish new items to your feed.

There are many RSS feed readers, also known as ‘aggregators’, to
choose from. I started off with ‘FeedReader’, which is a
freeware application for Windows.

Get it at: http://feedreader.com

After trying out a few other readers, I’ve now settled on
‘FeedDemon’ which was written by Nick Bradbury, the creator of
TopStyle and HomeSite.

You can get FeedDemon which comes with a 20-day free-trial
period at: FeedDemon.com

Here’s a good list of the readers available:
http://www.2rss.com/readers.php

RSS is published in XML format. All that means is that the
extension used is ‘.xml’, without the quotes. So, for example,
my new feed is located at:
http://www.netprofitstoday.com/blog/wp-rss2.php

If you go to that page, without using a reader, you’ll see
mostly gobbledy-gook. Look closer and you’ll see that the coding
starts to make some sense.

Here’s an example of how a single news ‘item’ appears on an XML
page:

Not only can you lose a guy in 10
days, you could lose 14,000+ of your subscribers OVERNIGHT.
Learn how to avoid making this costly mistake.

When you use a feed reader, such as those mentioned above,
you’ll see the feed in its proper, easy-to-read format.

To create the XML page, I used ‘Feed for All’, an RSS feed
creation tool. The ‘Feed for All’ software also comes with a
free trial and is available at: http://feedforall.com/

Here’s how the item above appears in an RSS reader.

How to Lose 14,000+ List Subscribers Overnight Not only can you
lose a guy in 10 days, you could lose 14,000+ of your
subscribers OVERNIGHT. Learn how to avoid making this costly
mistake.

The title, ‘How to Lose 14,000+ List Subscribers Overnight’, is
linked to
http://netprofitstoday.com/_npc/2004-12-14.html#mistake which
readers can click to read the full article.

So far, so good, but how do you get your feed published so
people can read it?

There are a huge number of RSS directory sites. At the top of
the heap in a Google search, I found Robin Good’s ‘RSSTop55 -
Best Blog Directory And RSS Submission Sites’ See it at:
http://www.masternewmedia.org/rss/top55/

So, in a nutshell, get a reader, and an RSS creation tool.
Create your feed and submit it to the directories.

Traffic to your sites will increase and so will your revenues.
Real simple (syndication).

This is a cursory overview of how RSS works. I confess that I
did a considerable amount of reading to come to that
understanding.

Here are the 2 resources I found most useful:

Paul Short’s ebook is a comprehensive work on everything you
wanted to know about RSS and blogging, and probably more.

http://NetProfitsToday.com/rss-paul-short/

Although it won’t give you a ‘how-to-RSS’ explanation, I also
found Dr. Mani’s 41 ideas on how to profit using RSS feeds quite
valuable.

http://NetProfitsToday.com/rss-drmani/

© Copyright Rosalind Gardner, All Rights Reserved.

Article by Rosalind Gardner, author of the best-selling “Super
Affiliate Handbook: How I Made $436,797 in One Year Selling
Other People’s Stuff Online”. To learn how you too can suceed in
Internet and affiliate marketing, go to:

http://hop.clickbank.net/?nathanoct/webvista2

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Just imagine. Everytime someone visits your website, theire browser notifies them of your RSS feed. No, it’s not as interuptive and no where near as annoying as popup subscription boxes but still a good chance to get people to subscribe to something you have to offer. In a nutshell, that’s how auto discovery works. There ’s usually a small flag somewhere in the browser telling people your feed is available for them and if the visitor is interested in subscribing, they will simply click subscribe - much like bookmarking a page.

Now you know how it works, why is it so important? For one, many feed readers and browsers already support auto discovery RSS feeds. But perhaps what’s more important, Microsoft is incorporating this starting with Internet Explorer 7. Internet Explorer still commands a good chunk of browser share out there, especially those who are new to the Internet or non technical Internet users. If your RSS feeds are not auto discovery enabled, it’s a good chance you’ll lose out on a bunch of subscribers.

As it is today, browsers like Firefox, Opera and Safari can auto discover feeds. Many use this to subscribe because it’s just so much easier. While this group may not be that large but why should you not take advantage? If just making your feeds auto discovery friendly you get an extra subscriber, even if it’s only one it would be worth it because it costs nothing but maybe 2 minutes of your time.

So how do you find out if your feeds are auto discovery friendly? The good news is, if you’re using a blog to manage your content, many have this feature built in. But it doesn’t hurt to just check it anyway. If you don’t use a blog, chances are, your feed is not auto discovery enabled.

Before I go, here are two little tips that would help your RSS distribution and subscription using auto discovery.
1. Put the auto discovery tag in other web pages too. Just because it’s not a blog doesn’t mean you can’t have an RSS feed on it. Take advantage of that, put your feed in your main website’s template. Now you have two opportunities to get in touch with people. When you update your website and when you update your blog.
2. If you use a service like FeedBurner to track your subscriptions, remember to update the feed URL in your blog or website template. This way, you’re capturing all your feed traffic statistics.

What’s next? Go make your RSS feeds auto discovery friendly right now. Because RSS is not always visible to us, don’t run the risk of forgetting this.

For step-by-step instructions how to check if your page has auto discovery, visit http://www.techbasedmarketing.com/auto-discovery-step-by-step.html.

Lynette Chandler helps entreprenuers leverage readily available technology for their marketing. Learn how technology can help your marketing today.

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As with innumerable sectors, the sentiment of the business relationship directly effects the progress of the BlueSkiesCareers.co.uk firm. Back when the business was first operating there was an aim in mind, and that was to increase the normal level of service that both candidates looking for marketing jobs and clientele receive in recruitment service firm.

There is one clear distinction which divides BlueSkiesCareers.co.uk from their rivals, which is that at some point or another every member of their recruitment personnel has spent time working at an marketing agency or client side. That is handy since it can guarantee the recruiters appreciate an unclouded understanding of what both candidates looking for marketing jobs, and clients with available a marketing job.

The business has four offices, in London, the Midlands, the North West and Yorkshire; sourcing candidates wanting for a job in a marketing position. Blue Skies give recruitment solutions for the freelance or permanent positions.

They cover innumerable distinct sectors, even so the most fashionable are their job with a marketing agency. The recruiters are also exceedingly straightforward to communicate with and there should without doubt be someone in one of their offices who can help you. Have a look around on the site first, this should give you the confidence or perhaps the drive to get what BlueSkiesCareers.co.uk is really about for yourself. It’s fun and also really easy to click about, there are sections about everything you yourself may want; find the ideal jobs in marketing, news, happenings, ratings, companies the recruiters recruit for, and also even a section where you yourself might well discover quite a bit of interview advice.

Within Blue Skies, Blue Skies Careers possess a targeted area called b.creative. The agency work a lot with the agency side of the marketing sector and help to exhibit some thrilling work. They meet repeatedly with talented creative folk, and also with folk who have experience in brand to brand marketing. If you are an art worker, copywriter or designer working on or offline, then why not use b.creative to aid you yourself acquire that next special member for your business’s team. Find marketing jobs at the Blue Skies site. It is a fine site and they are experts in the feild.

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Past life regression should unearth the reason why we have problems with folk in our present life or why we are worried of certain things. You have brothers around you in your current lifetime that you have astonishingly met before, just imagine being competent to learn what happened and what your relationship was to them at that past time and remove blocks that plague you in your current time and even ascertain talents and bring them into your present time. Past lifetime regression, aka PLR, is tremendous.

When you are having a past life regression, also known as PLR, session you would regress to the lifetime you most need to learn about in your current lifetime. This is super and might point out a great deal about your present life and help you will to go forward with a greater understanding of yourself, your life and the people around you. Find out what life you had before with Past Life Regression.

You can often also learn why you are the individual that you are, now that is magnificent. If you like nature perhaps you were once a farmer, if you adore to travel perhaps you were an explorer. Instead of forgetting our strengths we should embrace each of them.

Every single experience is astonishing and unique. Other people have unearthed places they had lived in before and just knew where to go.

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“I’d put that baby pram down if I were you, sir” the guy said, nonchalantly, in a manner which suggested he’d rather be somewhere else, anywhere but here. Before it all happened, he’d never have thought he’d be wielding baby prams in the face of anyone, let alone the face of the person he was currently levelling a top of the line pram at. He’d didn’t even have any experience in babies, let alone have enough knowledge to be able to use a pram effectively, not that he had much experience in anything, beyond his line of work. Biting nervously at the edge of his lip, eye darting nervously from side to side, he took his free hand and patted at the top of his brow, which was growing slightly damp with perspiration. Damn, it’s getting hot, he thought. Not much he could do about it now, it had all spiralled beyond anyone’s control a long time ago, and this final pram thrust would reveal the true outcome of all that he had strived so hard to achieve. His heart was pounding hard and fast, filling his ears with the rush of coursing blood. The men that surrounded him were far larger than him, as was the weaponry each of them was carrying. There was no way he was getting out of this one without taking some drastic course of action. He decided now was the time to do so. As he thought this, he tensed, closed his eyes and thrust the pram forward, towards the man in front of him, the man gasped, nothing more. This final thrust was an exclamation mark on everything that had led to this point, he released his fingers from the handle.

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A custom home theater is defined as a unit that will provide you with the excitement that you have always wanted, designed specifically for your needs, in the convenience of your house. If you are thinking about the installation of a home theater, you may want to ponder the custom designed products that are available from several of the top manufacturers. There are alot on the market and many of them will provide you with a huge range of possibilities. For those seeking to invest in a home theater to enjoy, why not have one custom designed to fit the specific needs and desires that you have? It may be the best solution but there are points to consider.

Many of today’s top manufacturers of home theaters, such as Panasonic, Bose, and Sony will offer the home theater options that are able to be completely customized. They understand that consumers have varying degrees of needs. If you walk into a home theater store, you may find that this is what they are promoting as the best solution to their customers. ‘Come and design your own home theater’. You need to be careful not to spend more than you need to and get the experience that is just right for your specific room. The value of having a customized system is that you can select the type of features that will suit you the best, and you will also be able to get the products that you need rather than those that come pre-packaged with a complete system. It may make sense to consider a custom designed product.

So how do you know if a custom home theater is right for you? A recommended way to go about this is to jot down all the things you must have in the new theater. If you need a wireless system, then make sure you put this high on the list. What about high definition quality? Surround sound? These are important aspects and can be found on a variety of systems that are available today. After composing your list of ‘absolute must haves’ you may be surprised that you can find an off the shelf system that has 95% of it. This could save you money, allowing you to upgrade other areas of your entertainment room. You can even put your savings toward a nice movie sofa, one that you and the kids can sprawl out on.

Home theaters make a wonderful investment in your overall enjoyment. There are plenty of options out there to mull over. You may find that the home theater system that is already out there is just about perfect for your needs. You may also determine that the one that is out there is really too big or complicated to use for your home entertainment needs. Going with a custom designed theater puts you in the position to acquire the very best product for your money.

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