How to be a Powerful Persuader
from Business Know-How
Selling is the art of creating a desire in the mind of a buyer and satisfying that desire so that buyer and seller benefit. Now, that may seem a bit old fashioned for many of today's salespeople, but I believe the principle still holds true - particularly if we're attempting to persuade a customer. If you're going to persuade someone to change their behavior, their viewpoint, their attitude, any other aspect of their business or personal life, then you're talking about changing a mindset. More

Turning Web Browsers Into Web Buyers
from Inc.
Imagine you owned a grocery store in which roughly half the people who loaded up shopping carts suddenly left them full in the aisles and took off without buying a thing. Most merchants would consider that a crisis, but on the Web, it's the norm. The median abandonment rate is 40 percent for consumer-products companies and 58 percent for service companies. So how do you turn abandoned shopping carts into sales? More

National Health Care: How Small Business Will Fare
from BusinessWeek
Even though taxes may increase and the quality of care diminish, would a national health plan would benefit small business owners? This author thinks so. More

Top Ten 2009 Email Marketing Services Review
from Top Ten Reviews
You don't need to be a graphic designer to create an attractive email or newsletter. A good service has various email development features to help you every step of the way. You can import an HTML page or use one of the many email templates provided by the service. Add attachments, pictures, sound files, background images and more. iContact comes in at No. 1, followed by Benchmark at No. 2, and Constant Contact comes in at No. 3. More

Treasury to Buy Small Business Loans, Report Says
from The New York Times Deal Book
The Treasury Department is gearing up to start a $15 billion initiative to stimulate lending by the Small Business Administration by using funds from the federal bailout program to buy up SBA loans, The Washington Post reported. More

Seven Steps to Stimulus Money
from Entrepreneur
Well, there is good news and bad news regarding ARRA, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. With nearly $800 billion in funding, there is always good news and bad news. First, let’s look at the bad news. If you have absolutely no experience selling to government at any level--federal, state or local--the likelihood that you’ll land any significant money is minimal. Now let’s look at the good news. First, notice the phrase "significant money." In government terms, this is seven figures and up. If you have no experience, can you still be involved? Possibly, but it will take time, effort, homework and persistence. More

Speed Up Your Website with Better Image Optimization in Photoshop
from UX Booth
Keeping image size to a minimum is an important part of keeping your sites visual weight low. By understanding a bit about image compression, and how to optimize images for web, it’s possible to significantly cut down on image size while improving image quality. More

Six Lessons From the Best Marketing Campaign Ever
from Fast Company
Last month an unlikely underdog stunned the marketing world at the International Cannes Advertising Festival. At the show, a single marketing campaign took home a Grand Prix award in three categories simultaneously, something that had never happened before. The unanimous winner was not a Fortune 500 brand with an advertising budget of millions, but a small tourism board promoting a little known island off the Great Barrier Reef. And while tourism and the travel industry may seem far removed from your business, a big part of the reason for the amazing success of this campaign was not what they were marketing, but how they used social media to do it. In that, there are some lessons anyone trying to promote a product or service could use. More