No Contract Needed!

My Wife and I went looking for new cell phones. Our contract was up, 2 years ago, we never renewed because they didn’t require it, and plus we weren’t sure if we wanted another contract. We were with the same company for over 10 years, so we weren’t sure if we wanted someone else. Anyway, we wanted new phones with better text and web access. What we really wanted was to get on Twitter and Facebook with our phones, plus a few other sites. But we didn’t want to purchase a $600 Blackberry. So in order to get free phones we would have to enter into another 2 year contract, which we weren’t ready to do again. So we decided to look at all the major cell phone providers, you know who they are, before we agreed to another contract. We even looked at Boost Mobile, a new provider in our area. Boost didn’t require a contract, we could get a Blackberry for $150 bucks, and all data plan that includes everything for $60 a month per phone. Which we both like because we can get on the web, get some great free apps, and get on Facebook. They even provided a way to reload your account, it’s called Re-Boost. Re-Boost is a way to reload your account to fund your plan. I will end with this, these guys, Boost Mobile, are worth considering for our next provider. I will be reading more about them to make sure their the right fit for us.

Are you a business owner looking to increase your sales in this economy? I am, and I’m always looking for new ways to increase my sales. Lately however it’s been really tough going with sales. It seems what ever I try to do it’s just not working like I want it to. Some of the things I have is running discounts and compiling services, selling packages basically. I’ve even lowered prices on a few of the products I offer, which has worked a little. But when you start lowering prices it underscores your products services in my opinion. And then what do you do with the customers you have paying full price, do you lower them as well? I know I would want my price lowered if I was a customer paying full price.

So I’ve been looking for new ways to get my name out there. One way is marketing offline, something I’ve never thought about before. Since all of my services and products are related to webmasters and site owners I’ve never marketed offline. I’ve been thinking about doing some direct marketing by sending out fliers. I’m even thinking about sending a postcard to some of my customers to let them Know I appreciate their business. I think by sending a full color postcard could go a far way, and hopefully bring in new customers. I know I would like to receive a great looking postcard with the vendors I do business with. The cost of a few postcards is very cheap, and the amount of business coming in could be huge. After all word of mouth is the best form of marketing. The more people you have saying great things about you will grow any business. What do some of you think about marketing online services offline, do you think it would work?

I just read an article online that states that the Blu-ray Disc Association recently started to license their technology to Chinese manufactures. You all know what that means, Blu-Ray players for under $100 bucks. I hate to say it, but that’s when I’ll get one. If we could build these players and sell them at a much more affordable price I would have gotten one a long time ago. Right now these Blu-Ray players are selling for more than $200, which is way to high in my opinion. And the disc’s cost about twice as much as the standard DVD, why? I once heard that making a Blu-Ray disc was cheaper than making a standard DVD. The same happened when we went from a VHS tapes to a DVD, it was cheaper to make the DVD. At the time they where selling the DVD for twice the amount of the VHS tape. If these makers would stop being so greedy we wouldn’t need Chinese manufactures to get the pricing under control, and people would by more things made in the USA. I really feel that if the maker of anything would charge reasonable prices for their products we would be much better off than what we are now. The greed needs to stop!

What in the world happened to FAO Schwarz? I had no idea they filed for bankruptcy in 2002, and then again in 2003. Then I read that not to long ago they were sold to Toys R Us Inc. I’m not sure how will Toys R Us will do with them, or if they even fit in with them. FAO Schwarz only has 2 locations, that I know of. One is their flagship store in NYC, and the other one is located in Las Vegas. They also run a catalog business, which up till today I thought they where doing very well. I guess their main customers, the rich folk aren’t buying their toys anymore. I once went to their store in NYC and saw race care their listed for over $25,000, a kids race car. Their toys are over priced, only the rich shopped there. Now with Toys R Us taken them over maybe we’ll see prices come down to where everyone will be able to afford that crap.

I have a few questions for all of you. Are your fed up with your hosting provider? Does your site have a lot of down time? And do you feel that your hosting provider could deliver much better customer service? If you answered yes to any of these questions you need to seek out another provider, fast.

If you’re business website constantly goes down it will cost you money, and customers. If you’re a site owner, business or personal, you know how hard it is to find reliable web hosting, which is very critical to your business. As most of you know, when your site goes down you just want to pull your hair out. You purchase a plan, your promissed up site time, then out it goes, drives me nuts. So do what I did, research, research, and research your next provider. Call them, talk to someone on the phone. Most of these providers don’t offer toll free numbers, but that’s not a big problem. They just want to reduce the calls for low level questions. To avoid phone charges, call from your cell phone. I know I’m running on here, but I can’t stress enough, call your provider, and research them. Good luck on your searches.

Most “experts” think before you sell your small business you should maybe try to acquire another company to look bigger. You should maybe also think about taking on investors. Also, you need to know how much your business is worth. Think you already know that number? Most of you already think you know – but you could be wrong. Most of the entrepreneurs out there just take a wild guess at it. So, before you sell, know your businesses true value. You should maybe hire a business broker to evaluate business. They could give you a true value of what your company is worth in this economy. And last, don’t forget to do your research, after all you want full value.

For doing one of the biggest scams around the world last year, Intel Corp, the biggest chip maker will pay euros $1.06 billion in fines. That comes out to about $1.44 billion is U.S dollars. Intel had used illegal sales tactics to stop other chip makers from coming to market. This hurts us, the consumers, we had a cheaper product to buy but couldn’t, because Intel paid them off. One of the other chip makers paid off was AMD, which should be fined as well. After all they took payment to delay computers with their chip in it.

The European Commission stated that Intel broke the law. That law is the EU competition law. They simply paid another maker not to sell their product, which is breaking the law, so now they must pay. About 2 years ago Microsoft pulled the same scam, they where fined euros $899 million, which I think their appealing. I’m sure Intel will appeal as well. Other country’s around the world are fining Intel as well. They better just pay their fines and move on, after all they took advantage of every consumer out there. If they pull this scam again their going to be unable to sell their crap anywhere, and that would be the end of them.

I was just reading that Twitter will be raising another 100 million dollars in new funding. In the same report it states it now puts Twitter at a worth of $1 billion. There is no way Twitter is worth $1 billion, they haven’t made one cent yet. Their losing money every day. This just shows that people in charge of investing people’s money really don’t know what their doing. I say that because the $100 million will be coming from investment groups, which control other people’s money. I believe Twitter will start making money some day, but not what people investing in now will want to see. And then the worth of Twitter will sank and people will loss their money once again. And the only one’s getting rich are the creators of Twitter, the one’s that will be laughing all the way to the bank. Lets not forget that Twitter is nothing but a micro-blogging service, which anyone can setup. Their service gets hacked into all the time because of the simple script their running. Just wait about a year when other scripts come on for micro-blogging services. You’ll be able to by one for $50, just will hope your site catches on. A company started in 2006, hasn’t made one cent, no customer support, worth $1 billions, how dumb does that sound.

Not to long ago a test was done by Time Warner Cable Inc., which went very well, according to them. The test was charging more to their customers that went over their limit of data traffic. This test was done in one market to make sure their system can charge the right rate and monitor customer usage. I was reading that if you where a customer paying $30 a month you had 5 gigabytes of transfer data. And if you went over that limit you would be charge $1 for every gigabyte over the 5. If you ask me the 5 gigabyte limit is way to low. I would burn through that amount in the first week. I would consider switching to a new ISP if this comes to my area. Time Warner Cable is taking advantage of hard working people, this is wrong. Since they think everything went so well they have choose to role this out to 4 more major U.S. markets. And if your wondering if other ISP are doing the same thing, that would be a yes. But no where’s near the lows of transfer data that Time Warner Cable is giving. The other ISP’s are offering limits starting at 60 gigabyte all the way up to 250 gigabytes. So you can see why I think Time Warner Cable is taken advantage of people. If they try this with me I will leave them and switch to DLS or find another Cable provider. However, with all that being said, not all ISP’s are going to be doing this, so this just might keep the other ISP’s in check.

If you are in business or thinking of going into business for yourself then read on. The hardest part of running or starting a business is securing funds. Most businesses fail within their first year, not because of poor customer service, or your products and service. It is because of the o-mighty dollar. Most businesses that start out today require a lot of money. And if you don’t have the funds to pay for your basic requirements for at least a year out your chances of failing are significantly higher. Basic needs would include things such as paying yourself, your employees, and paying for operating expenses. Now you are probably asking, how do I get the funding if I have been turned down by a few banks? I say, you’re not alone in getting turned down by banks, and don’t take it personally. Banks have tightened their belts on handing out business loans. They mostly have been handing out loans that are considered very low risk. So now it’s time to look elsewhere. Check out loan and funding companies. Their interest rates will be higher, but the chances are you’ll get your money. Some will require a few minimal requirements. You really need to look for the money. If you look hard, you’ll find it, it’s out there. Good luck in your searches, and make sure you read all small print before you take out the loan.