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Guru Round Up: The 43 Best Investment Ideas For 2014

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Fri, 09 May 2014 23:10:00 +0000

Matt Schifrin, Forbes Staff

Managing editor of investing, markets and personal finance.

Article from http://www.forbes.com/sites

Date posted: 1/06/2014 @ 1:15PM

Last year was one for stock market record books as index fund buyers added 30% to their nest eggs while many hedge fund managers under performed. Oddly, some of the smartest investment advisors believe that despite the run up, selected equities still look attractive.

T. Rowe Price’s Head of U.S. Equities John Linehan is taking a cautiously bullish approach: “Moving forward, U.S. stocks are unlikely to match their recent strength…On the plus side, corporate health remains strong and valuations are neutral. There are still attractive areas, such as companies that are benefiting from the reindustrialization of America. Market tailwinds and headwinds are now more balanced, so we believe it’s time to be cautious.”

Linehan is essentially saying that 2014 will be a stock picker’s market. His T.Rowe Price Value Fund, for example, holds among its top holdings Irving,TX’s Flowserve Corp.(FLS) , a maker of pumps, valves and seals used in a host of industries. It also owns a significant amount of specialty chemical and materials company Celanese Corp (CE).

As has been Forbes’ tradition over the years, we have gathered a selection of “Best Ideas” from some of our favorite money managers and investment advisors. You’ll find their recommendations below:

Buy: Ballantyne Strong (BTN)

BTN has tons of cash thanks to sales of digital equipment to movie theaters that switched to the new standard. That’s now largely played out and it would have been easy for BTN to blow cash on a “diworsification” acquisition. But instead, BTN made a great accretive purchase: Convergent Corp. with a growth business (digital content for out-of-home advertising, etc.) and an operating profile adjacent to BTN’s network support center that serves digital theaters. This debt-free company still has lots of cash (40% of the stock price) and the stock still has a measly (0.59) price/sales ratio.

Buy: Rite Aid (RAD)

I first recommended Rite Aid in June 2011 at $1.05 and again in January at $1.45. The stock now trades above $5.00 and I still like it. My original investment case remains alive and well. One aspect of this is that the company’s remodeling efforts, emphasizing its new fresh-looking “wellness” format is working. The transition still has a lot of legs left: Only a little more than 1,000 stores have been renovated thus far, out of a total of 4,600. And with more efficient operating practices, cash flows remain very healthy (as was the case even before GAAP net income moved above zero), meaning the company can comfortably pay the interest on its still-considerable debt and refinance as necessary.

Note, too, my investment case had not and still does not assume RAD will surpass or catch up to its main rivals Walgreen’s (WAG) or CVS Caremark (CVS). Instead, I continue to believe that even after RAD’s 2013 rally, the stock’s valuation remains far enough below those of WAG or CVS to enable shareholders to benefit even as RAD’s operations continue to make baby steps toward the levels maintained by the industry leaders. Bear in mind that price/sales is very much influenced by margin, and there is plenty of room for RAD’s operating margin to make progress relative to peers as store-overhaul attracts more revenue and improves overhead-cost coverage.

Buy: Omega Protein (OME)

The stock market has shown itself to be interested in the LOHAS (lifestyle of health and sustainability) through high valuations on such large issues as Whole Foods (WFMI) and Lululemon (LULU), and we’ve done well so far with such recent selections as Gaiam (GAIA) and Primo Water (PRMW). Omega Protein, which catches menhaden, a wild herring-like fish found along the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico coasts and harvests a variety of protein and oil products, could turn into an intriguing stealth LOHAS play

At present, more than 90% of the business comes from animal feed products produced from OME’s proteins and oils. That, in and of itself, is a nice business given that these ingredients are especially good for swine and fish, which are in high demand given increasing appetites for pork and seafood. But it’s not necessarily a straight-line trend given variations in annual fish catch, product yields derived from the catch, etc. (So far this fishing season, catch has been down but yields are up).

Going forward, however, product for human consumption seems like it’s shaping up as an attractive growth driver as supplement manufacturers increasingly come to appreciate the benefits of fish-based proteins and oils, which contain Omega-3 fatty acids not produced in the body and which therefore must be obtained from food or special supplements. The mundane valuation metrics for shares of this modestly-leveraged, profitable and strong cash-flow generator do not seem to account for this prospect.

Richard Lehmann

Editor, Forbes/Lehmann Income Securities Investor

Buy: Energy master limited partnerships

Income investors should look to energy related master limited partnerships (MLPs) for income in 2014 and beyond. Such partnerships offer high current income, steady dividend growth, inflation protection and tax deferral to boot. Better yet, they offer long term price appreciation as the domestic energy boom in the U.S. will continue to displace imported oil and gas for years to come.

There are three ways to play this: by direct purchase of MLPs, by buying a closed-end fund specializing in them, and by buying an exchange-traded fund that holds a composite of the industry. For direct purchase, look at the pipeline companies Plains All American LP (PAA, 4.78% yield/10.19% dividend growth) and Kinder Morgan Energy Partners LP (KMP, 6.75%/8.45%). Pipelines offer the most reliable dividend because they don’t depend on the price of oil and gas.

To get a broader selection and specialized management look for a closed-end fund such as Kayne Anderson MLP Investment Co (KYN, 6.49%/9.44%) or Fiduciary/Claymore MLP Opportunity Fund (FMO, 6.66%/8.40%). To buy the broadest cross section of this market, the Alerian MLP ETF (AMLP, 6.32%/7.23%) offers a low fee indexed approach which has worked well. No matter which approach you use, an investment in this sector belongs in every portfolio.

John Buckingham

Editor, Prudent Speculator and CIO, Al Frank Asset Management

Buy: Ensco PLC (ESV)

Ensco is the world’s second largest offshore driller. The firm operates across six continents with one of the newest jackup and deepwater fleets in the contract drilling industry. In its last few earnings releases, ESV has shown a relatively impressive ability to keep operating expenses in check and generate solid free cash flow. I believe that the outlook for deepwater drilling remains attractive and Ensco is well positioned to benefit as new builds come online and it realizes favorable contract rollovers.

ESV has a solid balance sheet and future cash use should provide another near-term catalyst, coming in the form of additional rig capacity, debt reduction, share buybacks and dividend increases. On that last point, the driller recently announced a 50% increase in its quarterly dividend (from $0.50 to $0.75). ESV trades for less than 10 times trailing 12-month earnings and for a little more than 8 times the current 2014 consensus earnings estimate, while the shares also boast a 5.3% dividend yield.

Buy: American Eagle Outfitters (AEO)

American Eagle Outfitters is a retailer of high-quality clothing focused on 15- to 25-year old shoppers. AEO operates more than 1,000 stores in North America and ships to 81 countries worldwide via its Web sites. AEO is down 25% since early August, tumbling after reporting very disappointing second quarter results due to poor product execution in women’s apparel and the need to offer a high level of promotions to drive foot traffic and in early December issuing weak guidance for the fourth quarter.

I believe the shares offer an attractive long-term opportunity, just as they did when I had a previously very lucrative stint with the company from 2000-2008, even as I respect that the teen retailing space is challenging. AEO has overall brand strength, especially in denim, and management is focused on improving product assortment, implementing inventory management enhancements and growing its international presence. Additionally, I am quite smitten with the balance sheet, which sports no debt and $1.75 per share of cash and short-term investments, and 3.3% dividend yield.

Jim Oberweis and Dave Covas

The Oberweis Report

Buy: Ligand Pharmaceuticals (LGND)

Ligand Pharmaceuticals, a biopharmaceutical company based in La Jolla, Calif., offers investors a unique biotech opportunity that is profitable today with sustainable profitability going forward. Its business model is focused on drug discovery and partnering with pharmaceutical companies at an early development stage, handing off the late-stage drug development, regulatory matters and commercialization and collecting royalties, milestones and license fees in return.

The company made a transformative acquisition of Captisol in 2011, a formulation technology that improves the function of molecules that may otherwise be sub-optimal. As partnered drugs that depend on Captisol technology get approved, Ligand stands to earn royalties from those drug sales. In October Pfizer announced the FDA approval for Duavee, a new treatment for hot flashes and prevention of post-menopausal osteoporosis. We expect significant near-term growth from two blockbuster drugs; Ligand is receiving growing royalty payments from sales of Promacta for low platelet count (co-discovered by Ligand and GlaxoSmithKline) and from sales of Kyprolis for multiple myeloma. It currently has five royalty-producing drugs in its portfolio and we think it can nearly double this to nine in 2014, providing additional revenue streams while diversifying its business even further. We believe Ligand can grow revenues 38% in 2014 to $65 million, with earnings more than doubling to $1.40 per share.

Ross Gerber

CEO, Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management

Buy: Apple (AAPL)

Apple is a cheap stock in a tech sector that’s getting very expensive. Apple is dominating the holiday season with its tablets and phones. The refreshed product line is doing much better than expected. I expect Apple’s China Mobile deal to meaningfully add to earnings next year. The real kicker is if Apple comes out with any new product. A TV will bring this stock to new highs. It has an iconic worldwide brand and this company certainly deserves at the minimum the market multiple. I see nice upside this year with or without a television.

Buy: Tesla Motors (TSLA)

Tesla is not a cheap stock but with the pullback recently over car fires it presents a great opportunity. This is not a car stock but a company that is transforming the car industry. The model S is a great and safe car and the NTSB will confirm this in a few months giving the stock the boost it needs to rebuild its momentum in 2014. The problem is inexperienced drivers crashing the car, not the car. Sales will continue to be strong for the model S and the new model X coming out late 2014 will be an amazing SUV. This will be an incredibly sought-after car. It will also be a further catalyst for the company in 2014; the demand will outstrip supply for many years to come. Co-founder, CEO and Product Architect Elon Musk delivers and I think he will continue to in 2014.

John Reese

Editor, Validea Hot List

Buy: HCI Group (HCI)

Property and casualty insurers from Florida sound like a risky proposition. But HCI has an advantage. Florida’s state-run insurer—which was created as a lender of last resort but became the lone option for many after several big insurers left the state—is being forced to divest a substantial portion of its policies because it grew too large. The forced sale has let firms like HCI pick and choose from some very profitable policies.

That’s led to stellar growth for HCI, which has grown earnings at a 32% pace and sales at a 51% clip over the long term. The state policy divestiture is continuing, and HCI has a lot of cash left. Its net cash/price ratio (net cash is cash and marketable securities minus long term debt) is more than 35%, helping earn it a 100% score from my Peter Lynch-based Guru Strategy. The Lynch model also likes that HCI trades for just 8.8 times earnings, making for a bargain-priced 0.28 P/E-to-growth ratio. HCI also gets a perfect 100% score from my Motley Fool-inspired model, thanks in part to its $9.84 in free cash per share and 92 relative strength, and a 92% score from my Martin Zweig-based model.

John Dobosz

Editor, Forbes Dividend Investor

Buy: Brookline Bancorp (BRKL)

If you’re not a Forbes Dividend Investor subscriber, you are not yet aware of my apparent predilection for regional banks. Of our 196 currently recommended stocks, 25 of them are regional or savings banks—by far the biggest industry group represented among past picks.

In truth, I don’t have any prejudicial fondness for the financial sector. It’s just that these banks flash the kind of value and comfortable dividend coverage that I seek out. Plus they have all done very well since they were recommended. The SPDR Regional Banking ETF (KRE) that tracks the overall group was up 28% from May 1 through the first of December. Our bank stocks gained an average of 35%, with some like TrustCo Bancorp (TRST) and First of Long Island (FLIC) surging more than 40% since May. Current yields on our regional bank recommendations average 3%, double the 1.5% yield on the KRE.

With fundamentals still looking attractive and valuations still modest, this smaller bank out of Massachusetts currently sports the highest overall score for any savings banks on the model I used to select it. Brookline Bancorp is the holding company for Brookline Bank and First Ipswich Bank in Massachusetts, and Bank Rhode Island. It maintains lending and deposit relationships with small- to mid-sized businesses and individuals.

In 2013, Brookline benefitted from higher loan and deposit amounts as well as better performing loans. For the full year, analysts expect $0.54 in earnings per share. The dividend has been steady since April 2009 at $0.085 per quarter, good for an annual payout of $0.34 and a 3.6% yield. Brookline trades more cheaply than it has in recent years. At 16 times earnings, the stock is well below its 25 average price-earnings ratio since 2008. Getting back to that average P/E produces a $13.50 stock. The average price-to-sales ratio over the past five years has been 5.7. Based on sales over the past year, that P/S multiple would produce a $16 stock price. Split the difference and you’re still looking at 66% potential upside if the stock trades at historical valuations and maintains current sales and profits.

Buy: Transocean (RIG)

It’s usually a sign of underlying buying interest in a stock when it gains in price on a day when the overall market is negative. That’s what happened on December 2 with Switzerland-based Transocean, the world’s largest offshore contract driller for oil and gas wells. Its shares ticked higher by 0.38%, albeit on light volume, while the S&P 500 dipped 0.13%, and even industry-specific Market Vectors Oil Services ETF (OIH) was down 0.43%.

There’s a lot to like about Transocean these days. In November it struck a deal with Carl Icahn, who owns nearly 6% of the company, and was agitating for a number of changes. He got another one of his people on the board of directors, and Transocean also cut the number of board seats from 14 to 11, giving existing members greater weight. Icahn also extracted a pledge that Transocean will boost profits by $800 million through cost cutting and increased efficiency.

Most significant for dividend investors is that Icahn succeeded in getting the company to agree to pay a $3 per share dividend next year, up 33.4% from the current $2.24 annual rate. RIG has a current yield of 4.6%. Transocean will also explore spinning off some of its assets into a master limited partnership structure.

After taking a hit after the April 2010 explosion and spill on its Deepwater Horizon rig at BP’s Macondo Well in the Gulf of Mexico, earnings are back on the rise. Analysts expect Transocean to earn $4.18 per share in 2013, up 5.5% from 2012. Revenue should be higher by 3.5% to $9.52 billion. For 2014, earnings are forecast to grow 35% with sales up 6.7%.

Current valuations make a good case for jumping into Transocean. Its average price-sales ratio over the past five years is 2.03, 6.4% higher than today’s P/S multiple of 1.91. With $26.40 per share in expected sales for 2013 that average P/S implies a $53.60 stock price. It trades at a 75% discount to its five-year average P/E ratio, but at 43.8 times trailing earnings it’s rather plump and reflects the effects of the spill costs. Nonetheless, at 8.9 times 2014 earnings, which are growing at better than a 30% clip is pretty cheap.

Buy: M.D.C Holdings (MDC)

There was a significant bottom for housing stocks on October 3, 2011, from which the iShares Dow Jones U.S. Home Construction (ITB) ETF rose 206% through May 13 of 2013. PulteGroup (PHM) soared 560% and KB Home shot higher by 375%. Since mid-May it’s been a different story. The ITB is down 15%, and many builders have seen their shares trade lower by 25% or more.

After the pullback, there are some good pockets of value in housing and one place to find it is in shares of M.D.C. Holdings. The Denver-based homebuilder is down 27% in the past six months after shooting 150% higher from October 2011 through May 2013. Founded in 1972, MDC builds and sells first-time and move-up single-family homes under the Richmond American Homes brand name in Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Maryland, Nevada, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Utah and Virginia.

2013 was a banner year for MDC. Revenue is expected to grow 36% to $1.64 billion, and earnings are forecast to jump to $6.06 per share from $1.28 in 2012. For 2014, sales growth should moderate to 6.1%, while the consensus earnings forecast is $1.91 per share.

Dividends are a big part of the MDC story, having been paid without fail since 1987. The company maintained the payout through the financial crisis and the amount has remained steady at $1.00 per year since November 2005, giving it a current yield of 3.4%. The payout is well covered by earnings. In December 2012, MDC prepaid the entire year of dividends for 2013.

MDC looks cheap at current multiples. Over the past three years, the stock has traded at an average price-sales ratio of 1.51, compared to its present P/S multiple of 0.87. With $33.55 in expected revenue per share in 2013, MDC would be a $50 at its three-year average multiple.

Taesik Yoon

Editor, Forbes Investor

Buy: LMI Aerospace (LMIA)

LMI Aerospace is a leading supplier of structural assemblies, kits and components and a provider of design engineering services to the commercial, corporate, regional and military aircraft markets. Hurt by lower-than-expected operating results—especially in the back half of the year—LMIA’s stock got clobbered in 2013.

However, the company’s operations should rebound strongly is 2014—boosted by better performance from its engineering services business and recovery in profit margins stemming from additional synergies associated with its acquisition of Valent Aerostructures, improved plant efficiencies, and the absence of cumulative cash adjustments, which negatively impacted margins in 2013.

Buy: Rovi Corp. (ROVI)

Rovi is a global leader in technology solutions that power the discovery, delivery, display and monetization of digital entertainment. The company serves cable, satellite, telecommunications, mobile and Internet service providers, consumer electronics manufacturers, and entertainment and online distribution companies including Apple, Comcast, eBay, Google, Panasonic, Samsung, Sony, Toshiba and Verizon.

A strategic decision to not sacrifice profits for volume forced the company to take a more conservative view on the expected level of contract closings for the second half of 2013. This led to two downward revisions of full-year revenue and earnings guidance over the past three months, resulting in a sharp sell-off. But I would not write off ROVI so quickly.

The company’s desire to obtain appropriate value on potential licensing contracts is the right decision from a long-term growth perspective in my view. And while it may be taking longer to secure these deals than initially expected, I remain confident that they will be obtained. Given its attractive valuation, I expect the stock to rebound sharply once this happens.

Buy: CVS Caremark (CVS)

CVS Caremark, together with its subsidiaries, provides integrated pharmacy health care services in the United States. Its recent third quarter 2013 earnings report was strong and the stock gained 7.5%. Net revenues rose 5.8% year-over-year to $31.97 billion—aided by claims growth in its specialty pharmacy business. Pharmacy same-store sales were up 5.7%, while front-end same-store sales fell 1.0%. CVS also raised its full year earnings per share guidance slightly to $3.94-3.97.

In November, CVS announced it will acquire Coram LLC, a leading provider of infusion therapies and nutrition services, from Apria Healthcare Group for $2.1 billion. While the transaction is not expected to be immediately accretive to earnings, it expands the CVS’ presence in the specialty pharmacy services market and should contribute to growth in future periods. Over the near term, I expect additional opportunities stemming from the Affordable Care Act to help fuel further growth ahead.

Marilyn Cohen

President, Envision Capital Management

Buy: International Game Technology Bonds 5.50%

It is the season for 2014 recommendations. What investments will work and which will fail?

It seems the choruses of professional and retail investors singing the bond markets demise are a bit off-key. The reason is that aging baby boomers know from past equity market declines putting everything into stocks now at all-time highs just may not be so prudent. Nothing is cheap: stocks, bonds or currencies.

So investors whose stock market wounds are healed but whose memories are still fresh, know that a bond allocation is imperative. It’s just how and what type that makes all the difference.

No matter what the bond market mutual fund managers tell you: There’s enormous risk of other people panicking and selling their bond funds than ever before. We have interest rate risk, credit risk and other investors panic selling risk; that’s the trifecta. Remember the May-June municipal bond fund sell off? Investors panicked and the selling was wicked and painful. Don’t put yourself in that position; buy individual bonds that have short final maturities or will be called. Rates rise; you can wait it out. Investors stampede in or out; you can wait it out…assuming maturities are 6 years or shorter.

My best ideas for 2014 include International Game Technology Bonds 5.50% due June 15, 2020, non-callable (Cusip: 459902AS1). This slot machine and gaming systems manufacturer is no one trick pony. IGT produces gaming software used on Internet sites, which is a growing business. Earnings for 2014 should roughly be $1.28-$1.38 according to JPMorgan Chase. If you believe as I do that the economy and consumers are all getting stronger, than the gaming industries will be a beneficiary. If you pay 106 for bonds that’s a 4.43 % yield to maturity. These BBB rated, investment grade bonds, should serve you well.

Buy: Hanesbrands Inc. 6.375%

When you think about the necessities of life put “underwear” in that category. Our tighty whities are usually not thought about—but they should be. And synonymous with this is Hanesbrand, the maker of bras, T-shirts, socks, underwear, hosiery, active wear and casual wear. Its pristine brands include: Hanes, L’eggs, Playtex, Wonderbra and Maidenform to name a few.

Hanesbrands’ gross margins are expanding and its recent acquisition of Maidenform certainly gives the company a lift (pun intended). With cotton prices way off their 2011 highs, Hanesbrands’ sales, gross margins and cash flow continue to improve. In fact, the 2013 Maidenform acquisition should generate $500 million in additional sales within a couple of years. With $ 450-$500 million in free cash flow, operating margins are expected to be up 12%-14%. This BB credit has nowhere to go but up in credit quality. Buy Hanesbrands Inc. 6.375% due December 15, 2020 callable beginning December 15, 2015 (Cusip: 410345AG7). Pay 110 and you’ll yield 2.77% to the 2015 call or 4.68 % to maturity. Bonds are callable after December 2015 with 30 days’ notice.

Phil DeMuth

Financial Advisor, Conservative Wealth Management

Buy: AQR Style Premia Alternative I (QSPIX)

With central banks using a crowbar to force everyone into risky assets, it is prudent to have a portion of one’s portfolio that will not be fed into the wood chipper by rising interest rates the way stocks and bonds usually are. I have no idea whether rates will rise in 2014; I’m simply saying that it would be prudent to guard against the risk. This fund goes long and short a diversified pool of strategies and should have little correlation to a vanilla 60/40 portfolio.

Charles Rotblut, CFA

Editor, AAII Journal

Best Investment Ideas

If there is any consensus about 2014, it is that the year is going to have unexpected twists and turns. Right now, we know some of the potential risks: changes to monetary policy, Washington politics, Iran, North Korea and elevated stock valuations. We also know what could potentially help investors’ portfolios: corporate earnings, sustained economic growth and accommodative monetary policy (even if it is less accommodative than it has been this year).

What we don’t know are the actual rates of change in earnings growth and economic expansion or the exact factors that will influence both. You and I could make forecasts, but they would simply be forecasts and nothing else. So how should you position your position your portfolio if the outlook for 2014 is uncertain?

Determine the correct mixture of stocks, bonds and cash that makes sense given your investing time horizon (which can be in excess of 20 years even if you are retired). Then determine your emotional tolerance for risk. These two decisions will help you identify where on the scale of conservative to aggressive your portfolio allocation should be.

Though this may sound overly simplistic, the reality is that many forecasts are wrong. If forecasts are often wrong and investing success is significantly influenced by not making big mistakes, then taking a long-term view with your portfolio allocation may be the best investment idea for 2014 and beyond.

Jack Adamo

Editor, Jack Adamo’s Insiders Plus

Buy: U.S. Bancorp Series-A Preferred (USB-A)

“Be Fearful When Others Are Greedy and Greedy When Others Are Fearful” – Warren Buffett

If you don’t trust this market you’ll like U.S. Bancorp Series-A Floating Rate Non-Cumulative Perpetual Preferred Stock. The dividend rate is the greater of 3.50% or three-month LIBOR plus 1.02%. At the current price of $770 the yield is 4.55%. Your rate won’t go lower than that and you have better inflation protection than with TIPS. If the $1,000 par-value shares are redeemed, your capital gain is 30% at the current price. Should we face deflation, 4.55% will be noticeably better than what’s out there.

In the last 25 years three-month LIBOR, shown in turquoise, has been higher than 9% and as low as 0.24%. At my buy limit of $800, the base yield and yield at LIBOR 5% would be 3.75% and 7.75%. Buy the stock only with a limit order, never a market order. With patience, you can probably get the shares below $775. U.S. Bancorp Series A Preferred is a buy up to $800. Preferred stock symbols are not uniform across brokers. Make sure you get the right one.

Buy: Seaspan Series-C Preffered Shares (SSW-C)

Problem: You want to park some cash for a couple of years until the market outlook is clearer, but you’d like a decent return while you wait. Uncle Sam says no. I say yes.

Seaspan Corp. Series-C 9.50% Cumulative Preferred is redeemable at $25 on 1/30/2016, and if not redeemed by 1/30/2017, the rate goes up to 11.875%. Redemption is likely in 2016 because the company’s current cost of capital is significantly lower. The shares trade for $26.50 today, yielding 5.73% to redemption. At my buy limit of $27, the yield to redemption is 4.64%. With some patience, you should get the shares closer to today’s price.

Seaspan leases container ships on long-term charter. It is a very safe, steady business model, unaffected by spot-rates. 70% of its leases are with shipping companies owned by China and 20% are with major Japanese shippers. During the 2008 financial crisis, Seaspan did not cut rates and did not miss a single payment from its lessees.

Reported earnings fluctuate noticeably, due to hedge accounting rules, but cash flow easily covers preferred and common dividends. Buy Seaspan Series C 9.50% Cumulative Preferred up to $27.

Jim Lowell

Editor, Forbes ETF Advisor; Fidelity Investor

Buy: Fidelity Select Construction & Housing (FSHOX)

Jim Lowell: “Buy what consumers are buying.”

Manager Holger Boerner invests in companies involved in the design and construction of residential, commercial, industrial and public works buildings, as well as companies that provide construction products or services or those involved in real estate. Towards the end of 2013, forward looking building permits and construction spending rose significantly more than expected (mainly on apartment permits), and housing prices followed their trend of rising a bit more slowly month-to-month. The risk is a rising rate environment that could make mortgages too expensive to pursue—I’d buy on the first big dip because, whether a secular or cyclical trend, I think this fund paves the way for pent up demand from consumers who are clamoring for more.

Buy: Fidelity Select Automotive (FSAVX)

Manager Annie Rosen owns companies that produce and/or sell cars and other vehicles, as well as parts and services related to the industry. In 2014, I don’t think U.S. consumers will take their foot of the car buying pedal. I do think that lenders will grease even more car buying wheels—not just here. Western Europe, collectively the #3 car sales market, saw year-end car sales rise for two consecutive months for the first time since 2011 … Spain saw its cash-for-clunkers program work like ours. Overall, Europe feels like a classic six-month lagging recovery relative to our own—car sales and auto-related stocks should correlate to the ongoing recovery there.

Meantime, China’s car sales were up 25% from the same period last year; its economy may be slowing, but it is growing car buyers at high speed. I don’t see that abating. Moreover, while emerging markets saw car sales fall year-over year, as their biggest trading partners recover more, 2014 emerging markets car sales could shift overall sales into high gear.

Buy: Fidelity MSCI Consumer Discretionary Index (FDIS)

I think Fidelity MSCI Consumer Discretionary Index complements the actively managed sector selections well. It’s the lowest cost, commission free consumer discretionary exchange-traded fund out there. This exchange-traded fund is made up of companies involved in the production of automobiles, durable goods, textiles, apparel and leisure equipment, as well as service companies such as hotels, restaurants, leisure facilities, media services and consumer retailing. Top 10 holdings: Amazon.com, Walt Disney, Home Depot, Comcast, McDonald’s, Time Warner, Ford Motor, Starbucks, Priceline.com and Nike. Foreign investments make up 3.6% of the holdings.

Buy: FelCor Lodging Trust (FCH)

My best idea for 2014 is FelCor Lodging Trust, a real estate investment trust that owns 61 upper-scale hotels around the U.S. Going into the recession in 2008, FelCor had too many hotels in weaker markets and too much debt. Over the last few years, FelCor has refocused is portfolio on premier properties in the stronger hotel markets. Since 2010 FCH has sold 24 hotels and currently has three more under contract to sell. It has used the proceeds from these sales to upgrade many of the hotels in its portfolio, as well as reducing debt. In addition, it has been able to add a few marquee properties. FelCor has also refinanced much of its debt to reduce interest costs. All of these actions now have FCH’s financial results heading in a positive direction.

Furthermore, macro industry conditions remain very favorable. Demand for hotel rooms has been growing steadily for the last few years, as both business and leisure travel rebounds. However, the supply of hotel rooms has been relatively flat with very few new hotels being built. Both the broad industry trends and the company’s strategic moves bode well for FelCor stock. Moreover, the company has just reinstated a small dividend, and I expect the payout to grow as FelCor’s results continue to improve.

Disclosure Note: Accounts managed by an affiliate of the publisher of The Turnaround Letter own FelCor Lodging stock.

Kelley Wright

Editor, Investment Quality Trends

Buy: Philip Morris International (PM)

I believe 2014 will be a transitional year for the markets. With an apparent budget deal in Congress and no stomach for another fight on the debt ceiling, the primary policy issues have been dealt with. With more clarity from Congress the Fed will be able to focus solely on the data, which should allow for the tapering process to begin. Without the Fed backstop, I believe there will be a modest correction in the first half year and then a recovery to all-time highs. Fourth quarter 2014 could be rough as I believe a major correction will occur in 2015. My thought then is to play it safe with Philip Morris International. The tobacco giant sells its products in approximately 180 countries in the European Union, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, Latin America and Canada. The current cash dividend is $3.76 per share and the company has increased the dividend on average in excess of 10% per year the previous 12 years. The optimum buy price based on the current cash dividend is $82 or less.

Martin Leclerc

Portfolio Manager, Barrack Yard Advisors

Buy: Cisco (CSCO)

One sector in the admittedly expensive U.S. stock market that remains attractive is “mega-cap” IT Companies. They are selling for low multiples of earnings/cash flow. They represent relatively high current shareholder rewards: the dividend plus buyback yields are more than 5% (and the payout ratios are low with room to grow). As a group, they represent high financial strength. Admittedly, they have disappointed investors over the past couple of years but I argue that has been baked into their current valuations: current forward P/E multiples of low teens versus about 20X prior to the Great Recession.

In other words, these firms used to be thought of as growth companies but not any longer. Given that I don’t believe there has been a paradigm shift that has destroyed their business models—particularly for the long product cycle businesses—I think the lackluster growth of the past couple of years is cyclical and not secular in nature. I believe it is timely to buy into this sector due to valuations and to my common sense conclusion: it is hard to imagine the economy growing without a meaningful pick-up in IT CAPEX spending.

My two favorite stocks in this theme are Cisco and IBM.

Cisco is a dominant player in its industry (global telecommunications infrastructure) that has grown by acquisitions and possesses industry leading financial strength. CSCO’s has net cash of some $30 billion, or $5.60 a share, a P/E of 11X and a dividend yield of 3.1%. The dividend plus buyback yield is about 5% and the payout ratio is 33%. CSCO is a highly profitable company and has grown its EPS by 12% over the past 10 years but that growth has slowed over the past few years to something like high single digits. Free cash flow yield is 10%.

Buy: IBM (IBM)

IBM also sells at a discount of 30% to the S&P 500. It has a free cash flow yield of 9% and a dividend plus share buyback yield of more than 7%. IBM’s product cycle is long and it benefits from a blue-chip balance sheet. Historically it has enjoyed net profit margins in the mid-teens and return on invested capital of 20%. IBM has significant economies of scale working in its favor and most of its commoditized businesses have been jettisoned: 86% of its revenues are derived from value-added services and software solutions.

The barriers to entry for potential competitors in its core business are high. I think the longer-term future for IBM could be better than the market expects. If not, a fact remains: IBM has an entrenched position in its marketplace and has grown earnings per share over the past decade by 12% a year, on average, through a combination of efficiencies, share buybacks and modest growth. Paying 12X earnings for that combination seems like a pretty good deal to me.

James Berman

Editor, The Berman Value Folio

Buy: Arcelor-Mittal (MT)

The market has branded the steel stocks, especially Arcelor-Mittal, with a scarlet “S” for slowdown. But at 40% of sales, MT is priced for the end-time. Seen through a contrarian lens, I think the value is there. Like any deeply cyclical stock, you should buy MT when the economy is slack, prospects bleak and the recovery dim. By the time the all-clear sounds, bargains will be gone.

At first blush (and based on GAAP earnings) MT looks like a hot molten mess, with more than $5 billion in losses over the past year. Yet, the bulk of these losses were non-cash goodwill write-offs of overpriced acquisitions. In reality, MT is a cash cow, with nearly a billion dollars in positive free cash flow over the same period. When talk of taper transitions to talk of everything else, as it inevitably will, MT will be on everyone’s buy list. That will be the time to sell.

Disclosure: I own Arcelor-Mittal in accounts for myself and clients; I’m a shareholder in Insight Guru Inc., the parent company of Trefis.

Buy: Applied Materials (AMAT)

Applied Materials, the largest company in the semiconductor fabrication equipment sector, has engineered a transformative merger with the third largest company in the sector, Tokyo Electron (8035: JP). The combined company will be a behemoth worth about $30 billion. Synergies will result in cost savings of $250 million in the first year and $500 million in the third year, but more important is the combined company will gain significant market share.

The semiconductor fabrication equipment sector is likely to grow from $28 billion in 2013 to $37 billion in 2017. The combined company is projected to generate $18.2 billion in revenues and $4.6 billion in operating income in 2017. This translates to earnings per share of $2.40 per share. As a reference, earnings over the last four quarters totaled $0.59. It is reasonable for the market to accord a P/E north of 20 to AMAT in 2017; as a reference, ASML Holding (ASML), the second biggest company in the sector, trades at a forward P/E (FYE 12/31/14) of 20. Based on the foregoing scenario, the stock will be north of $48 in 2017 compared to the present price of about $16.

Buy: WisdomTree India Earnings (EPI) and iPath MSCI India (INP)

In 1970, the GDP of India was $63.5 billion. In 2012, the GDP of India stood at $1.87 trillion, an increase of 2945%. India is now the tenth largest economy in the world based on market exchange rates. However, based on purchasing power parity (PPP), India is the third largest economy in the world. PPP eliminates misleading comparisons of GDP based on converting India’s GDP into dollars.

India’s GDP grew at 9.3% in 2010-2011. Due to slowing reforms, corruption and high current account deficits, the growth in India dramatically slowed to 4.8% in third quarter 2013.

The trigger for this call is the election results just released in four key Indian states. In a landslide, the opposition party BJP humiliated the ruling Congress party. India is set for national elections in May 2014; BJP is likely to win. BJP is business friendly and its leader, NarendraModi, has the fortitude to carry out tough reforms.

With reforms, India can easily get back on the track of 7%-8% growth. Based on the historical quantitative data, such growth in GDP may triple the Indian stock market in five years. Two of my favorite exchange-traded funds are WisdomTree India and iPath India.

Martin Sosnoff

CEO, CIO and founder of Atalanta Sosnoff Capital, LLC.

Buy: Citigroup (C), Boeing (BA), Celgene (CELG), Gilead Sciences (GILD), General Motors (GM)

For the new year, carry over from 2013 what’s made you rich. For me, this list includes banks like Citigroup, Boeing, biotech properties like Celgene and Gilead Sciences, and my last year’s favorite, General Motors. The rationale is low interest rates persist, price-earnings ratios stay in the upper teens and inflation is not a policy issue. Biotech is a go-to group because growth properties remain scarce and they’re capable of compounding earnings 20% per annum.

John Navin

Managing Partner, Next Door Partners

Buy: V.F. Corp. (VFC)

I like stocks that seem reasonably valued, are making money, low debt and which have uptrending chart patterns. Theoretically, it’s the best of both worlds—fundamental analysis and technical. It doesn’t always work, but your probabilities of success become skewed in the right direction.

V.F. Corp., in the apparel business since 1899, fits the mold for 2014 with steady 5-year earnings growth, under control debt and a P/E in line with the S&P’s . It’s helpful that it has been paying a dividend since forever.

The stock is trading above $60 after starting 2013 at $38. VFC has traded above its 40-week and 200-week moving averages for three straight years. Now that’s an uptrend.

The move from October to now is quite extended and probably requires a pullback. As long as the trending continues, though, I like it.

Matt Schifrin, Forbes Staff

Managing editor of investing, markets and personal finance.

Article from http://www.forbes.com/sites

Date posted: 1/06/2014 @ 1:15PM

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

A child’s financial growth

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Sat, 03 May 2014 02:07:00 +0000

Posted: Friday, May 2, 2014 12:30 am at http://www.registerstar.com/columnists/investment_ideas/

Submitted by James J. Armstrong

Managing Partner

Hudson Financial LLC

“Reading, writing, mathematics” — too bad that list doesn’t include personal finance. Most kids learn the basics of money and making change in elementary school, but probably won’t learn how to manage money unless they choose finance as a career path. That means it is up to all of us to see that our children reach adulthood prepared to face life’s fiscal challenges.

Earlier Is Better

The benefits of teaching children about money early on are both immediate and long term. In the short term, they may develop strong saving habits, learn how to make smart purchases, begin to understand the true meaning of “investment” and perhaps even learn why they can’t always get everything they want. In the long term, you can help them avoid accumulating debt. And by teaching the value of saving for the future, you can help them plan for financial security.

Where Does Money Come From?

Even very young children can begin to understand the concept of earning money. Explain that money is earned by working, and that you can only spend what you earn. To help them understand what it is like to get paid on a schedule, begin paying an allowance. Then help them to set goals for spending and saving their money. It is important, however, to make sure that you stick to the payment schedule; otherwise the lesson may be lost.

Experts differ on whether or not allowances should be tied to household chores. Although many people say children will learn more about personal responsibility if they do not receive money for pitching in around the home, others feel paying an allowance teaches them valuable lessons about working and earning. You also might consider paying your child for “extra credit” chores that they complete outside of their daily duties, such as helping out in the garden or washing the family car.

Make Saving Interesting

You hear it every time you enter a store with your child: “I want ... Buy me this ... !” Before reacting, pause and take a minute to collect your thoughts. This situation presents a great opportunity to teach another important lesson about personal finance: savings and interest.

Explain that people often save their money for items they want to buy. A simple savings lesson involves using a piggy bank, shoe box or empty peanut butter jar. Make the lesson fun by having your children decorate the “bank,” while explaining to them how you also use a real bank to save your money. Encourage your children to save a portion of their allowance for a special goal. As they save money, you might reward them with a small additional amount, just like a bank pays interest. At the end of each month, calculate how much they have saved and then chip in a certain percentage as interest.

Last, to further encourage the learning process, you might consider plotting a visual chart of their savings (include the goal) so they can easily see their savings grow. Remember to keep it as simple as possible, geared toward each child’s level of understanding.

Banking and Investing

Once your children have been saving enough to accumulate $50 or $100, take them to the bank to open their first savings account. Most community banks will allow children to open accounts with low minimum deposits. Some even have accounts especially marketed to kids to make the learning process fun. Make sure that your children receive a passbook so they can see the progress of their savings efforts, as well as the interest that accrues.

Once they have mastered banking with an institution, you can begin to teach kids about investing. For instance, when your child wants something that he or she can’t quite afford, discuss the value of saving versus borrowing. If you do extend credit, use a written IOU, establish a repayment schedule and charge interest. By doing this, you establish the framework for teaching your children that bonds and certificates of deposit are IOUs representing loans from investors to institutions.

Compounding

As your children get older and perhaps take on part-time jobs, their savings will likely amass at a quicker rate. Now is the time to review the lesson of compounding, or the ability of earnings to build upon themselves. Explain how compounding can be more dramatic over time; the longer money is left alone, the greater the effect. This can lead into a discussion about investing and how certain investments can have a greater ability to compound over time.

Giving a gift of stocks of well-established or kid-oriented companies can be an ideal way to teach your children about investing. (Note: Investing in stocks involves risks, including loss of principal.) Most children would love to think of themselves as owners of McDonald’s, Disney, or Toys “R” Us. Some companies even have shareholder meetings directed to children.

A Little Learning Can Pay Off

Teaching your children about our complex financial system may seem daunting, but you can help put them on the right track by encouraging smart habits now.

Is it worth your time and effort? As Benjamin Franklin once said, “An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.” Answering your children’s questions honestly and in terms they will understand may set the stage for a lifetime of smart moves.

The Lesson Plan

Ages 4 to 6: Introduce the concept of value — how money buys things. Point out the difference between nickels, dimes and quarters.

Ages 7 to 9: Expand the money discussion with the notion of having short- and long-term savings goals.

Ages 10 to 12: Consider opening a savings account in your child’s name. By this age most kids are able to calculate interest and make a simple budget.

Ages 13 to 15: Discuss the difference between saving and investing. Reward avid savers with a “grown up” investment in a kid-friendly stock.

Ages 16+: Get serious about checking accounts and possibly credit cards. Make sure your kids understand the difference between debit card and credit card transactions.

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

Spring Checkup: Five Investment Ideas for Your Portfolio

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Tue, 22 Apr 2014 10:34:00 +0000

By BlackRock, April 18, 2014, 09:00:50 AM EDT
From: http://www.nasdaq.com/

Since my colleagues and I put out our 2014 outlook late last year, much has changed and the economic backdrop has shifted.

Severe weather had a significant impact on first quarter economic data , and a major new geopolitical risk popped up in Ukraine . Indeed, if I could use one phrase to describe what's happened over the last three months, it would probably be "reversal of fortune," since the best-performing assets of 2013 underperformed, while the 2013 losers flourished. In the biggest surprise, bond yields fell as prices rose.

Nonetheless, we're sticking with the broad game plan we laid out in December for how to navigate this environment. As we enter the second quarter of 2014, investing opportunities appear more elusive than at the beginning of the year (and the challenges more evident).

However, as Jeffrey Rosenberg , Peter Hayes and I write in the spring update to our 2014 Outlook - The List: What to Know, What to Do , even though it's a tough environment, it's not one without opportunity. Here are five opportunities we think are worth considering this spring:

1. Stick with stocks . We still believe that stocks offer better value than bonds, even after a five-year bull market . At the same time, we expect to see continued low inflation and low interest rates, as well as a gradually improving economy- all factors that are supportive of stocks. As such, we expect that the market will push ahead in the months to come, although it will likely be a slow and uneven grind given ongoing geopolitical turmoil and Federal Reserve (Fed) tapering. As such, investors should have modest expectations, at least compared to 2013's outsized gains.

2. More international exposure. Within equities, we believe that, in general, many investors should consider paring back some U.S. exposure in favor of non-U.S. stocks. Despite the reality of geopolitical uncertainty, we see plenty of growth opportunities abroad and would encourage investors to expand their reach globally.

In particular, we have a favorable view toward eurozone and Japanese stocks. Events in Ukraine present some risks for Europe, but we believe both European and Japanese equities look attractively valued compared to U.S. stocks. Finally, for investors with a strong stomach and long time horizon, we suggest having some exposure to emerging markets , which offer a combination of attractive value and compelling long-term growth prospects.

3. Consider a flexible bond approach. It has been a tough time for bond investors, and conditions aren't getting any easier. What to do? Being flexible and diversified globally remains key. With yields likely to be volatile, and some areas of the fixed income market feeling the effects more so than others, a flexible, go-anywhere bond portfolio that can make adjustments on the fly is something to consider having in your fixed income toolkit.

4. Think high yield and municipal bonds. We continue to believe that investments such as high yield bonds and municipal bonds remain attractive sources of income. In regards to the latter, municipal bonds continue to look attractive versus both Treasuries and corporate bonds. We're seeing competitive yields on a before-tax basis-which only further illuminates the after-tax value. However given the likelihood of rising rates and improving data, a diversified and unconstrained approach is a necessary strategy in the tax-exempt space as well.

5. Go beyond traditional stocks and bonds. Investors could incorporate alternative strategies that can help broaden their diversification, protect against rising rates, and contribute to growth. (Remember, however, that diversification does not ensure profits or protect against loss.)

Diversifying with alternatives means adding new asset classes such as physical real estate and infrastructure investments. You also may want to consider new strategies such as long/short approaches that can be employed with both stocks and bonds to mitigate volatility, seek out returns and contribute to diversification. While the risks of long/short strategies include the possibility of losses larger than invested capital, we believe they can offer a powerful differentiated source of return and the potential for more consistent results over time.

To learn more about what might occur in the months ahead and how to capitalize on some potential opportunities, check out the spring update to our 2014 Outlook - The List: What to Know, What to Do .

Sources: BlackRock research

Russ Koesterich, CFA, is the Chief Investment Strategist for BlackRock and iShares Chief Global Investment Strategist. He is a regular contributor to The Blog and you can find more of his posts here .

Fixed income risks include interest-rate and credit risk. Typically, when interest rates rise, there is a corresponding decline in bond values. Credit risk refers to the possibility that the bond issuer will not be able to make principal and interest payments. Non-investment-grade debt securities (high-yield/junk bonds) may be subject to greater market fluctuations, risk of default or loss of income and principal than higher-rated securities.

There may be less information on the financial condition of municipal issuers than for public corporations. The market for municipal bonds may be less liquid than for taxable bonds. Some investors may be subject to federal or state income taxes or the Alternative Minimum Tax ( AMT ). Capital gains distributions, if any, are taxable.

International investing involves risks, including risks related to foreign currency, limited liquidity, less government regulation and the possibility of substantial volatility due to adverse political, economic or other developments. These risks often are heightened for investments in emerging/ developing markets, in concentrations of single countries or smaller capital markets.

iS-12235

The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc.

By BlackRock, April 18, 2014, 09:00:50 AM EDT
From: http://www.nasdaq.com/

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

How to Find Good Stock Investment Ideas

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Mon, 20 May 2013 03:26:00 +0000

By eHow Contributor

Article from eHow http://www.ehow.com/

If you do your own research for stock investments, then this article is a great starting point for finding some great stocks. There is a lot of information available on the web that enables you to find some excellent stock ideas before investing.

Instructions

1. Check out the following websites: Yahoo Finance, MSN Money and Stockpickr. All of these sites have some great information for stock investment ideas. On Yahoo Finance, take a look under the Investment tab and "Education;" On MSN Money, go to the Investing tab then "Stock Research" on the left hand column. Also, MSN Money publishes what they call "Expert Picks." This is basically a handful of investing experts who make recommendations for stocks and publish them free of charge. These expert picks can sometimes be very useful and lead to good investments, however I would not base your whole portfolio around them.

2. Go to www.MotleyFool.com. This website has probably some of the best information for independent investors. The website is a massive community of expert and amateur investors looking to share their own knowledge and make sound stock picks. When looking up stocks on this site, you not only get basic information about the company, but you can also see who is recommending the stock and if they are Bullish or Bearish on it. There is also something called CAPS, which is a rating system for specific stocks. If the stock has 5 stars, then it may be a golden investment opportunity. You can also see a list all of the stocks on the website that have gained the golden-clad 5 star rating.

3. If your really serious about making some money and finding profitable stocks, you can purchase MotleyFool.com's "Premium Services." A team of expert investment advisers will publish stock recommendations and sell them for a moderate price. According to the website, these stock recommendations have earned investors very high returns year after year. The site's most popular service is the Stock Advisor. It's a $199 per year newsletter that is currently earning investors around a 41% yearly return...Not Bad.

4. Also consider buying paid research services from websites such as Zacks.com. They publish expert picks on stocks they think will rise in the market. Be very careful when looking at these websites, though. Some sites say they are selling stock picks, but will often make exaggerated claims on how much money you could make. Sometimes these stocks are very speculative and risky (i.e. penny stocks).

5. Watch investing shows on MSNBC and CNBC such as Mad Money with Jim Cramer. Some people criticize these shows for the lack of accuracy of their stock picks. However for a new investor, these can give some good ideas for stock investments. From there, you can do some of your own research.

6. Look for booming industries or companies. A simple way to get great stocks ideas, is to look for the companies or industries that are up-and-coming or making huge trends in the market. If you think an industry sector is going to shoot up over the next few years (i.e. Alternative Energy sector), then buy some stock for companies in that industry (i.e. buy solar energy stocks!). Also, look at the fundamentals of a company. If you think a company is going to be profitable and have a good balance sheet, then consider buying their stock. A good example of this is Apple; excellent products combined with good company leadership and earnings lead this company's stock to almost $200/share in 2008.

eHow Contributor

Article from eHow http://www.ehow.com/

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

How to Research Your Business Idea

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Fri, 17 May 2013 07:36:00 +0000

Your brilliant idea may indeed be brilliant--or it may need some work. Here's how to find out whether you're ready for startup.

BY KAREN E. SPAEDER

Article from http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/

Somewhere between scribbling your idea on a cocktail napkin and actually starting a business, there's a process you need to carry out that essentially determines either your success or failure in business. Oftentimes, would-be entrepreneurs get so excited about their "epiphanies"-the moments when they imagine the possibilities of a given idea-that they forget to find out whether that idea is viable.

Of course, sometimes the idea works anyway, in spite of a lack of market research. Unfortunately, other times, the idea crashes and burns, halting a business in its tracks. We'd like to help you avoid the latter. This how to on researching your business idea is just what you need to keep your business goals on track.

The Idea Stage

For some entrepreneurs, getting the idea-and imagining the possibilities-is the easy part. It's the market research that doesn't come so naturally. "It's a big red flag when someone outlines the size of the market-multibillion dollars-but doesn't clearly articulate a plan for how the idea will meet an unmet need in the marketplace," says Aaron Keller, an adjunct professor of marketing at the University of St. Thomas in neighboring St. Paul and a managing principal of Capsule , a Minneapolis-based brand development firm.

That kind of full-throttle approach can cost you. "Entrepreneurs are often so passionate about their ideas, they can lose objectivity," adds Nancy A. Shenker, president of the ONswitch LLC , a full-service marketing firm in Westchester, New York. "Rather than taking the time to thoroughly plan and research, they sometimes plow ahead with execution, only to spend valuable dollars on unfocused or untargeted activities."

Market research, then, can prove invaluable in determining your idea's potential. You can gather information from industry associations, Web searches, periodicals, federal and state agencies, and so forth. A trip to the library or a few hours online can set you on your way to really understanding your market. Your aim is to gain a general sense of the type of customer your product or service will serve-or at least to being willing to find out through the research process. "For example," says Shenker, "if you don't know if your product will appeal to the youth market, make sure you include a sample of that population in your research efforts."

Your research plan should spell out the objectives of the research and give you the information you need to either go ahead with your idea, fine-tune it or take it back to the drawing board. Create a list of questions you need to answer in your research, and create a plan for answering them. "Utilize experts in planning and conducting research sessions," Shenker advises. "They can recommend what type of research is most appropriate, help you develop statistically valid samples and write questionnaires, and provide you with an objective and neutral source of information."

The type of information you'll be gathering depends on the type of product or service you want to sell as well as your overall research goals. You can use your research to determine a potential market, to size up the competition, or to test the usefulness and positioning of your product or service. "If, for example, the product is a tangible item, letting the target audience see and touch a prototype could be extremely valuable," notes Shenker. "For intangible products, exposing prospective customers to descriptive copy or a draft Web site could aid in developing clear communications."

Analysis

When working with firms on brand development, Keller first looks at a business idea from four perspectives: company, customer, competitor and collaborator. This approach allows Keller to scrutinize a business idea before even approaching the topic of brand development. Here's what he looks at for each of the four issues:

1. Company. Think of your idea in terms of its product/service features, the benefits to customers, the personality of your company, what key messages you'll be relaying and the core promises you'll be making to customers.

2. Customer. There are three different customers you'll need to think about in relation to your idea: purchasers (those who make the decision or write the check), influencers (the individual, organization or group of people who influence the purchasing decision), and the end users (the person or group of people who will directly interact with your product or service).

3. Competitor. Again, there are three different groups you'll need to keep in mind: primary, secondary and tertiary. Their placement within each level is based on how often your business would compete with them and how you would tailor your messages when competing with each of these groups.

4. Collaborators. Think of organizations and people who may have an interest in your success but aren't directly paid or rewarded for any success your business might realize, such as associations, the media and other organizations that sell to your customers.

Another approach is to research is SWOT analysis, meaning analysis of the strengths of your industry, your product or service; the weaknesses of your product (such as design flaws) or service (such as high prices); and potential threats (such as the economy). "[SWOT] enables you to understand the strengths and flaws, [everything] from internal information such as bureaucracy, product development and cost to external factors such as foreign exchange rates, politics, culture, etc.," says Drew Stevens, a St. Louis professional speaker and consultant who works with entrepreneurs in researching and marketing their ideas. "SWOT enables an entrepreneur to quickly understand whether their product or service will make it in the current environment."

Whatever your approach to evaluating your idea, just be sure you're meeting the research objectives you've outlined for your product or service. With those goals always top-of-mind, your analysis will help you discover whether your idea has any holes that need patching.

Checking Out the Competition

Assuming your research process has helped you uncover your competition, you now need to find out what they're up to. Shenker advises becoming a customer of the competition, whether by shopping them yourself or by enlisting the help of a friend. "Visit their Web site and put yourself on their list," she says. "Talk to your competitor's customers, too-ask them what they like or don't like about your competitor's product or service. If you conduct formal research, include a question like 'Where do you currently go for that product or service? Why?'"

Your aim is to understand what your competition is doing so you can do it better. Maybe their service is poor. Maybe their product has some flaws-something you'll only know if you try it out yourself. Or maybe you've figured out a way to do things better, smarter, more cost-effectively. Find your selling point. It's going to be the core of your marketing program, if and when you're ready for that step. It's also going to be what sets you apart and lures customers your way.

After all this-the idea stage, analysis of the idea, competitive analysis-you might find that your idea (and not your competitor's, as you'd hoped) is the one with the holes. Does that mean you need to scrap the whole thing and resign yourself to life as an employee? "Not always," says Keller. "Sometimes it just needs to be reworked or retooled."

That can be disheartening if you've already spent X amount of hours in the idea stage, plus X amount of hours on market research-only to find that you're not quite ready to get started after all. But taking the time to refocus your energies and determine why your idea needs some tightening is the best predictor of future success. "No entrepreneur wants to hear that his 'baby' is flawed, but only by listening and reacting to feedback can he give his idea a chance for success," notes Shenker. "Ask yourself, 'Is this a weakness that can be overcome?' If you can't create true value for your customer and your business, then it's time to pick another idea to pursue."

Remember, though, that many ideas simply need some fine-tuning. Before you panic and start flipping through your idea books again, closely consider whether you can make this idea work. After all, there was a reason you thought of that idea in the first place. Some ideas that seem like they'll be total duds after doing a little research end up being great successes. "Ideas that seem like a flop are always interesting to me," says Keller. "Sometimes you look into an idea and find it was just luck-but many times, you find the original founder had some clear insight into the potential. That insight was his or her focus, and it seemed to lead them to success.

"I've seen many people launch ideas that I thought were beyond foolish," Keller adds, "but then I learned more about the idea, the customer and the vision-and realized the true risk being taken."

When Your Idea Is Ready to Go

The market research you've conducted thus far ought to be a good indicator of where you need to go next with your idea. One key factor to consider is pricing. You want to do it competitively while also considering what the market will bear. For products or services that have a close competitor, Keller advises pricing with respect to the competitive position. "Higher-priced positioning requires an idea with enough relevance and importance to customers to overcome the gap between your idea and the nearest competitor," Keller says.

The beauty of being in business for yourself is that you have the option to make changes at will-so if a pricing structure isn't working, you can alter it. "Price high to start-you can always drop the price down," says Keller. "You can never go up."

Shenker adds that you need to be sure your product or service is delivering enough value to command the price you set. If possible, test different pricing offers as you go, and determine what works best.

When you're ready to get started, be sure you're selling where your target market is likely to buy. "Your marketing plan and budget should include a well-crafted distribution strategy," notes Shenker. If you'll sell over the Internet, budget for media to drive new customers to your site. If you'll sell via retail distribution, you might need workers with industry experience to help you reach your target market.

Remember, too, that you can always seek help in this long, arduous process of bringing an idea to fruition. The Internet, your local library, the U.S. Census Bureau, business schools, industry associations, trade and consumer publications, industry trade shows and conferences, and new-product development firms can be invaluable sources of information and contacts. "It's just a matter of seeking knowledge from as many sources as possible," notes Keller. It's also a matter of putting your ego aside and being willing to create a business that will not only survive, but thrive. "If you have an idea, don't be afraid to refine it, retool it, rethink it," adds Keller. "The more you do before you launch, the less you'll have to do [afterwards], and the less painful the lessons tend to be."

KAREN E. SPAEDER
Article from http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

Three tips for investors looking for income

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Fri, 17 May 2013 07:23:00 +0000

Adrian Lowcock | 16 May 2013
Article from http://www.hl.co.uk/news/articles/

Dividends paid by UK companies grew a healthy 6.1% in the first three months of the year, excluding special dividends, according to Capita Registrars' Dividend Monitor report.

In recent years investors have benefited from strong growth in UK dividends despite the weak economic climate. In 2012 UK companies paid out a record £80.4 billion in dividends with a number of one-off special dividends boosting the total. This year fewer special dividends are expected, but with these excluded, underlying dividends are forecast to grow 8.6% – an indication that many UK companies are in excellent financial shape.

The concept of equity income investing is simple - invest in the shares of well-managed companies whose dividends have the potential to grow over time. This provides a rising income, which if reinvested can create a snowball effect of compound growth. Furthermore, the shares of such companies often find favour with investors, meaning their prices rise. In our view equity income should form the core for most investors' portfolios, whether they are looking for income or growth.

Constructing a portfolio to generate an income can be relatively straightforward as long as you follow some simple rules:

Identify how much income you need. If your income requirements are too high then you might end up with a portfolio which pays a high income, but at the expense of capital growth. An income in excess of 5% is probably unsustainable in the long run.
Look after your capital. Many income-seeking investors look to maximise income without protecting their capital. A high yield can be a result of recent falls in the share price. This can signal there is something wrong with the business and the dividend might be cut in future. Good equity income investors look for companies that can pay a sustainable and growing dividend. This approach is likely to be supportive of the share price.
Diversify your income stream. If you are dependent on income from your investments, it is essential to have a mixture of investments from which the income is derived. Diversification will minimise the impact of events affecting individual companies. Investing in a number of asset classes can help to provide a more stable income - income generated from corporate bonds is generally less volatile than that from equities. Likewise investing overseas provides a further opportunity for diversification.

Adrian Lowcock | 16 May 2013
Article from http://www.hl.co.uk/news/articles/

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

6 Steps to the Perfect Pitch

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Wed, 15 May 2013 06:43:00 +0000

Learn to succeed with investors--from a guy who failed.

BY Scott Gerber | May 22, 2009
Article from http://www.entrepreneur.com/

Shortly after my college graduation, a few friends and I started a new media company. Within a few weeks we fleshed out the concept, wrote a business plan and set out to seek financing. With a little hustle, I managed to get us a meeting with a well-known investment firm to discuss the opportunity. Even though our business had yet to bring in a single dollar, and none of us had ever been the CEO of coffee shop let alone a multi-million dollar enterprise, we were all confident that we had a sure thing on our hands. After all, our financial projections forecasted gross revenues of $200 million. What investor could say no to that?

We'd be rich. All we needed to do was raise a small amount of capital--$15 million.

I remember thinking, "How hard could it be?" We were obviously, naïve, foolish and delusional.

There was one small problem with our plan. None of us had any idea how to pitch an investor. So I did what any clueless entrepreneurial upstart would do: Google searched "how to pitch an investor".

Nothing that I read online could have prepared me for what was to come. We would quickly find out that our presentation was doomed before we ever set foot into the meeting. In reality, it was doomed before we started writing the business plan.

At the beginning of the meeting one of the investors asked me to hand him a one-page executive summary review. I hadn't prepared a summary, so I handed him the first 11 pages out of the binder encasing my 95-page business plan. Strike one.

Less than four slides into my 32-slide presentation, the second investor interrupted me and said, "OK. Stop. I get it. You definitely don't need $15 million."

Defending our business plan, I overconfidently replied: "It can't be done for less."

"Really? It can't be done, huh?" he responded with a smirk masking a hint of laughter. Strike two.

Both of the investors then proceeded to hit us with a barrage of questions:

"How much money have you personally put into your business? Anywhere near $15 million?"

"Why should I pay a bunch of twenty-somethings with no track record $100,000 executive salaries?"

"How much revenue has the business produced to date?"

"Why should I give you $15 million when the company hasn't even made $15?"

"How can you possibly substantiate gross revenues of $200 million in year three?"

"Why are you trying to produce, market and distribute 10 products at the same time before you see if a single one sells at all?"

The questions went on and on. None of our answers were favorable. Strike three.

As you might have guessed, I didn't walk out of that meeting with a $15 million check. I later realized, however, that this was one of the greatest educational experiences of my young career. I learned more about real-world fundraising in 30 minutes than many entrepreneurs learn in a lifetime. To this day, whenever I pitch investors for capital, I always remember these six hard-learned lessons:

Less is always more. An elevator pitch is vital. Verbose presentations and lengthy explanations will not impress investors, and most likely will turn them off. Present your business in a manner that's short, sweet and to the point. Investors need to be confident that your business will attract and retain customers. If they don't grasp your concept in a short time span, they may presume that customers won't understand it either.
Never hypothesize. Execute, execute, execute. Inspire confidence with facts, not fiction. Most investors seek out low-risk businesses with proven managers that are as close to guarantees as possible. A company with cash flow, a track record and real-world experience has a better chance of getting investors than a business plan forecasting large returns. Find ways to test your business's viability on a shoestring budget, and turn your idea into a functional business before you seek investment.
Leave the hockey sticks on the ice. Excite investors about your big picture, but be reasonable and responsible. Avoid hockey stick projections. Respectable investors will not take you seriously if you present them with nonsensical financial graphs that claim your company's revenues will grow from $100,000 to $50 million in three years. Show investors that you have a grasp on reality with three versions of financial projections: best case, moderate case and worst case. Base each of these models on facts, past and present performance data, industry and competitor analyses and a series of well-thought-out, defendable assumptions.
Learn to love discount stores. Being cheap is chic. In an age where spending is out of control, you'll need to prove that you are a fiscally responsible manager who knows how to get the most out of a buck. Give yourself wiggle room in your operations and marketing budgets, but avoid being excessive. Never ask for a large salary or big-budget perks. Investors want you to be in a position where everything is on the line.
Rome wasn't built in a day. Your business won't be either. Investors are wary of funding over-eager businesses that seem destined to bite off more than they can chew. Before asking for millions of dollars to fund 50 divisions and hundreds of product lines, prove how well you can create, manage and fulfill demand for a single product. Demonstrate that your business can crawl before you say it can walk. Perfect your marketing tactics, sales strategies and operational procedures. Investors appreciate companies with sustainable step-and-repeat business models that are poised for exponential growth. Remember, even Google's success is based on a single product.
Choose not to be the smartest person in the room. Know what you know, know what you don't know and find the people who know what you don't know. Build a team of credible experts. The smartest leaders in the world are those who surround themselves with smarter people. Investors are funding a management team as much as they are investing in a great business concept.

Scott Gerber | May 22, 2009
Article from http://www.entrepreneur.com/

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

Whatever happened to these Fortune 500 companies?

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Mon, 13 May 2013 06:17:00 +0000

Here are seven companies from the first Fortune 500 that have since been merged, split up, or put out to pasture.

Article from http://money.cnn.com/gallery/leadership/2013/05/06/500-where-are-they-now.fortune/index.html?iid=SF_F_River

Armour

Though Henry Ford was attributed with the invention of the assembly line, Philip Danforth Armour employed a Model-T-like efficiency to the butchering of animals in his meatpacking enterprise. It was companies like Armour, in fact, that inspired Upton Sinclair's The Jungle. Every part of the animals was sold, either as meat, glue, fertilizer, or, later, soap.

Armour & Company had been making soap for years when, in the 1940s, it added a germicidal agent to its product, creating "Dial" -- the first deodorant. Dial sold so well that the company changed its name to Armour-Dial and expanded its offerings on the soap side. By the mid 1980s, the company had sold off its meatpacking operations, but kept its canned meat products. By 1991, it had changed its name to the Dial Corporation.

The canned meat side of the company lives on. Pinnacle Foods now owns Armour, which makes stews and soups, potted meat, hash and Vienna sausage.

Bethlehem Steel

The fall of Bethlehem Steel, which was formed in 1904 and dissolved in 2003, represented the crash of an American manufacturing icon. The company, headquartered in Bethlehem, Penn., supplied steel for railroad ties that helped build the country's transportation networks. During both World Wars, Bethlehem Steel supplied armor plate for U.S. soldiers and battleships.

National Dairy Products

The National Dairy Products Corporation was incorporated in 1923, formed out of two of the largest dairy and ice cream manufacturers in the U.S.: Pittsburgh's Reick-McJunkin Dairy Company and Chicago's Hydrox Corporation. In 1926, the company operated in 13 states across America.

Demand for its products soared during wartime years. In 1944, the company delivered 48 million quarts of milk, 8.5 million gallons of ice cream, and 101 million pounds of cheese to the United States government.

In 1930, National Dairy Products Corporation bought Kraft-Phenix Cheese. The combined companies went through several name changes together. By 1969, Kraft's brand strength ate National Dairy, and the company became known as Kraftco.

Last year, Kraft split again, separating its international snack business from its U.S.-based grocery products division, including loud orange cheese-type foods such as Velveeta that harken back to the company's dairy product origins.

International Harvester played a major role in changing the shape of American agriculture. The company was born out of a 1902 merger between Deering Harvester Company and McCormick Harvesting Machine Company. McCormick was founded by Cyrus McCormick, who invented the mechanical reaper, a horse-drawn device used to harvest crops, sparing workers the labor of reaping by hand.

After the merger, International Harvester manufactured big trucks and tractors. But as the business developed, it focused on building machines in general and became less involved with the agricultural side of the business. In 1986, the company changed its name to Navistar International Corporation, still a Fortune 500 company today that produces trucks, defense vehicles and RVs.

Radio Corporation of America

General Electric created the Radio Corporation of America, and to General Electric it has returned. In the meantime, the company pretty much shaped the world's consumption of media.

It started in 1919, when GE bought the American assets of the British radio company Marconi and formed it into RCA. At the beginning, RCA was financed by GE (GE, Fortune 500), AT&T (T, Fortune 500), and Westinghouse. When RCA bought Marconi, they also got David Sarnoff, who would later run the company. Sarnoff came up with the idea that stringing together organized broadcasts could help radio receiver sales. In other words, he created the first network. RCA built the National Broadcasting Company, or NBC, originally for radio broadcasts.

Sarnoff worked his magic on television, promoting the development of TV technology during the 30s and 40s. By that time, the Justice Department had separated AT&T, GE and Westinghouse from RCA via an antitrust lawsuit in 1932.

RCA ballooned. During World War II, it conducted research that ultimately contributed to the development of satellite technology and the space program. In 1965, it bought Random House, a publishing giant, and in 1967, it got into the rental car business with its purchase of Hertz.

Through the 70s and 80s, RCA shed many of its diverse assets, until 1986, when its creator GE bought the company, spinning off NBC as its own entity.

American Can

Not the most creatively named company in the Fortune 500, American Can was formed in 1901 by the merger of several canning plants around the country. The big canner was headquartered in New York, and was a major producer of tin cans as well as cartons, wraps and plastics for food, beverage and meatpacking companies. In 1957, two years after the first Fortune 500 list was published, American Can merged with paper cutlery-maker Dixie.

In 1987, American Can merged with the National Can Company to become, again with the creative names, American National Can Company, which French company Pechiney then purchased a year later. At the time, American National Can Corp. was the world's largest packaging company. That same year, other parts of the company were spun off to form financial services company Primerica (PRI).

Bendix Aviation

Inventor Vincent Bendix got his start in the business world with his invention of the Bendix hand crank starter device for cars, then moved on to improve automobile breaking devices. By 1929, Bendix saw potential in the growing aviation industry and changed the name of his company to Bendix Aviation Corporation.

One of the most important contributions to flight was Bendix's pressure carburetor for aircraft engines -- a device that ensures fuel delivery to a plane. Nearly all Allied aircraft during World War II were equipped with one. The company also sponsored the Bendix Transcontinental Air Race, a flight speed competition that Amelia Earhart entered in 1935.

In 1982, Bendix merged with chemical, oil and gas company Allied Corporation. In 1999, Allied merged with Honeywell, and the two companies took on the Honeywell name. Under Honeywell (HON, Fortune 500), the Bendix/King brand still makes devices for aircraft, including displays, flight controls and navigation equipment.

Article from http://money.cnn.com/gallery/leadership/2013/05/06/500-where-are-they-now.fortune/index.html?iid=SF_F_River

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

3 Investment Ideas for Biotech Investors

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Sat, 11 May 2013 05:32:00 +0000

by Brian Orelli, The Motley Fool Apr 30th 2013 9:20PM
Updated May 1st 2013 1:00AM
Article from http://www.dailyfinance.com/2013/04/30/3-investment-ideas-for-biotech-investors/

Investment ideas don't grow on trees. But for biotech investors, they do grow in laboratories. Here are three investment ideas that biotech investors should consider.

Bet on a billionaire

I'm usually inclined to bet on underlying technology rather than the management team, but there are some exceptions.

George Scangos has turned around Biogen Idec . Shares have more than quadrupled since he took the helm in the middle of 2010. Focusing the company's pipeline by getting rid of fringe products was clearly a good move. Fellow Fool Sean Williams drafted him to head his fantasy biotech company, with which I completely concur.

MannKind also has a pretty successful CEO in Al Mann, who became a billionaire founding multiple companies and selling them. For this investment idea, though, we're more interested in Mann's pocketbook than his wheeling and dealing abilities.

The company is developing a small handheld inhaled insulin product called Afrezza. The drug device has run into multiple roadblocks along the way but seems to be on its final approach toward landing on the market.

Whether Afrezza will be a commercial success depends a lot on how hard the product is marketed by MannKind or its marketing partner -- if it lands one. Diabetics are used to injecting insulin; it's going to take some serious promotion to turn around the mind-set of doctors and patients. Fortunately, Mann has the money to invest.

This is Mann's baby. It's his investment idea. But you're welcome to tag along.

Multiple shots on goal

Isis Pharmaceuticals has more than 30 drugs in development. Thirty! The thesis for this investment idea isn't all that complex: With that many drugs, something's got to work.

Isis' pipeline is built on an antisense technology. The drugs knock down the expression of disease-causing proteins by promoting the degradation of mRNA that encode for the proteins.

The technology has taken awhile to develop; Isis had to figure out a way to keep the oligonucleotides that bind to mRNA from getting degraded before they could do their job. But it's finally succeeded with Kynamro, a cholesterol-lowering drug it developed with Sanofi .

Partners like this investment idea

When Regulus Therapeutics went public last year, investors weren't the only ones buying the share offering; Regulus' partners and founders clearly thought it was a good investment idea, because they bought more shares. Lots of them. AstraZeneca, Biogen Idec, Sanofi, GlaxoSmithKline and Isis combined to purchase more than 70% of the shares that raised nearly $81 million for the biotech.

AstraZeneca, Biogen, Sanofi and Galxo are all working with Regulus to develop drugs targeting microRNAs. The technology, which was originally a joint venture between Isis and Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, is still in its infancy -- Regulus doesn't have any drugs in the clinic -- but clearly its partners think it's a pretty good investment idea.

The future of MannKind?

Will MannKind's disruptive technology revolutionize the way diabetes is treated around the world -- or will the FDA put the kibosh on this product before it even hits the market? In a new premium research report on MannKind, these complex issues are made crystal clear, in addition to showing you why to buy or sell the stock today. To find out more click here to grab your copy today.

The article 3 Investment Ideas for Biotech Investors originally appeared on Fool.com.

Brian Orelli, The Motley Fool Apr 30th 2013 9:20PM
Updated May 1st 2013 1:00AM
Article from http://www.dailyfinance.com/2013/04/30/3-investment-ideas-for-biotech-investors/

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

Dumb Idea: Investment Creates Jobs

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Thu, 09 May 2013 04:59:00 +0000

William Baldwin
Forbes Staff
url: http://www.forbes.com/sites/baldwin/2013/03/18/dumb-idea-investment-creates-jobs/
3/18/2013 @ 8:15AM

Investment is good, but not because it increases the number of people it takes to do something.

“Job-creating investment”–how often have you heard that phrase, especially from a Republican politician defending tax breaks for the wealthy? This economic claim is 180 degrees out of alignment with reality. The point of investment is to eliminate jobs.

Suppose you want to harvest forage crops. A $190 scythe will do the job. If you want to go faster, increase your investment by $471,595. Buy a model 7980 harvester from Deere.

A politician promoting the transition from scythes to farm machinery would, of course, talk about job creation. “Bring those jobs to East Moline! There will be jobs on the assembly line, jobs in the paint shop, jobs in the dealerships and jobs for the mechanics! Jobs! Jobs!”

But the modernization of agriculture does not replace 100 farm jobs with 100 farm machinery jobs. If it did, there would be no point to the exercise. You might as well have those workers out in the fields as sweating over parts bins in a Deere factory. They’d get more fresh air and sunshine.

No, the point of mechanized farming is to replace 100 farm jobs with only 50 factory and dealership jobs, or maybe only 5. On such job elimination is built the improvement of living standards over the past two centuries.

The correct line from the politicians would be: “Let’s cut the tax rate on dividends and capital gains to 15%, so that we can speed up the elimination of jobs.”

Bill Gates deserves admiration for working to eliminate polio. We should also be thankful for his other accomplishment. He eliminated a million secretaries.

A commenter says that companies invest not just to replace labor but to expand. Yes, companies invest in order to expand. That is the main reason they invest. But that is not quite the same thing as saying that the investment created the jobs.

If there is demand for houses, there will be demand for copper, and the copper miner will buy a new earth mover and employ a driver to run it. But it isn’t the investment in the machine that created the demand for the labor. It was the demand for copper that created the demand for the labor. The investment in the truck simply enabled the copper company to meet the demand for its product with one driver rather than with 50 blokes pushing wheelbarrows.

William Baldwin

Forbes Staff

url: http://www.forbes.com/sites/baldwin/2013/03/18/dumb-idea-investment-creates-jobs/

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

The Best Investment Ideas for 2013

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Tue, 07 May 2013 02:05:00 +0000

JANUARY 5, 2013

in INVESTMENT

Post at http://learnfinancialeducation.com/

This post is my first article for 2013 and I hope you had a good 2012. I’m expecting this year would be a great year and I’m really excited what God will do this year in my family’s life.

Our baby girl will be born this coming April. My wife and I would be very busy this year, there are many challenges on the way but I know it will be for our good.

In terms of financial aspect, I’m planning to be more active and aggressive in my saving and investing strategy. I’m planning to invest more money in mutual funds and start another website not related to finance.

I have several websites and all of them are related to finance, banking and investing. This year I want to start a blog not on the finance niche. I’ll post another article in the future about it.

The New Year brings a new hope for all of us. Many of us want to do things that we weren’t able to do last year. Some of us make New Year resolutions so that we can carry out a definite plan for the next year.

Perhaps some of these plans are related to your personal development, finding a new career, strengthening your family relationship, starting a new business, or finding good or best investments.

What are the Characteristics of the Best Investments?

Most of us are intimidated when the word “investment” is talked about. Maybe you will say it is only for the rich people and you cannot make investments since you are just an employee.

I must admit that before I have the same understanding and mentality about the topic of investment. Before I became interested about personal finance and financial education, I am not convinced that a simple individual like me can invest my money so that it will give some profit to me and my family.

So what are the characteristics of the best investments out there? I assume you have heard or seen in the news the several investment scams that were happened this year and several years ago. How do you know if the investment is the best and whether it is a legitimate one?

1. The Best Investment is Legitimate

Many so-called “investments out there are advertising to the public that they are the best investment that you can enter to. However, are you sure that it is legal or legitimate? Or perhaps you are throwing your money into a scam?

The first characteristic of the best investment is legitimacy. It should be a legal investment. It means it must be registered in the Securities and Exchange Commission and properly documented business registration from Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).

For example, mutual fund companies should be registered in SEC. If the company does not have document for SEC registration, then it must be a scam. SEC is the government agency that administers all investment companies in the Philippines.

You must also investigate first before putting your hard-earned money into that investment. Make your own due diligence. Look for its business registration and the people behind the company.

Always be doubtful when dealing with a new company because it can be a potential investment scam. One easy way to find information about the company is by using the Internet.

If you cannot find any information in the Internet about the company, then you should be doubtful and skeptic about it. A legitimate company must have its own website so that people who want to look for information can freely and easily it via the Internet.

2. The Best Investment is Not Hard to Invest In

Another characteristic of the best investment is the ease of investing. It should not be hard to invest in. The ease of investing may involve the access to the information of the company, the procedures and process on how to invest, the initial capital or money to be used when investing and the level of difficulty when withdrawing the money you invested.

3. The Best Investment Gives Passive Income

Passive income is the best way to earn an income. It is possible for every people to earn a passive income provided they will work hard for it at first.

However, not all people will not work hard to earn passive income. Many people would want quick money or investment ending up in frustrations and investment scams.

List of Best Investments for 2013

If you are planning to invest your money, I’m sure you want the best return or profit for your money. Of course, you must invest it in the best investments available today.

I would list here the doable and proven investments that you can start with. These investments are legitimate and great ways to invest for 2013.

1. Mutual Funds

Mutual fund is my first on the list because you don’t need any financial knowledge and expertise to begin investing in this kind of investment. I started investing in mutual fund in January 2010 after carefully studying its advantages and disadvantages.

I have written several topics about mutual funds in the past. If you want to learn more about it, you can see those articles in this link.

Mutual fund is a pool of money from individual investors like you and me. However, before you could start investing, you must open a mutual fund account through investment companies like FAMI, PAMI, Philam, BPI and many other companies.

2. Website or Blog

One of the best investments I have made in the past years is the blogs I have created that gives me residual and semi-passive income. Making your own personal website or blog is not hard to do, although not all people can earn money from it because it requires skills and hard work.

A blog can be a source of another income for you and your family. A word of advice: it may take several months or even years before you can actually earn a decent income from blogging.

Your primary focus during the first months of your site should be creating good information and content for your readers and visitors. During that time, you should also experimenting on the design and features of your blog to make it more appealing and nice to your visitor’s eyes.

3. Online Store or E-Commerce Business

Before I venture out to blogging, I have tried to sell some stuffs online using eBay. During that time, Sulit.com.ph is not yet in existence so my market is limited in reaching out to people.

Today, if you want to sell some products and services online, you have many options and tools to do so. You can sell through eBay, Sulit, Facebook, Multiply, or your own website.

However, if you don’t want to spend money on making your own site, you can start with Blogspot or WordPress. I see many people selling on Sulit and eBay because it has many visitors and users.

Therefore, I suggests you start with Sulit or eBay if you are planning to start your own online store or e-commerce business. It is not hard to open an account with these sites, it may take only 5 to 10 minutes to do so.

After creating your own account, you can start posting your ads with the details of the products you are selling. Trust and feedback from your past customers are very important when selling online so you should set a high standard when dealing with your customers.

4. Rental Apartment or Commercial Space

Renting apartment or commercial space will require a high capital but would definitely pay a handsome profit in the future. If you have a substantial amount of money that you can spend on buying properties or constructing a commercial building, it would be a good investment.

A friend of mine has commercial properties that he rented to tenants giving him passive income each month through the rental fees. That kind of investment is one best example of a best investment for 2013.

5. Education

Most of us who have graduated in college don’t consider to go back in school to study another course because perhaps of lack of time and money. However, in my point of view, a new education or knowledge would be a best investment in the future.

Though this may not be applicable for some people because of the limitations on their time. If you have enough money and time, why not consider learning new things like cooking, computer programming, playing piano and a lot more.

Finals Thoughts

Investing requires studying and knowledge about what you are investing. Without the knowledge, it would be risky and hard on your part.

The risk of losing money would be minimized if you know where do you put your money. Knowledge and studying will remove fear of losing money.

If you want to invest in the best investments for 2013, you should do your own part and not rely on other people or friends. Begin studying now which one will be the most appropriate for you!

About the Author:

Gil Tenorio is a blogger, a husband, a father, and an active Christian. He likes playing guitar, C.S. Lewis, Plants and Zombies and NBA. Follow him at Facebook, Google+, YouTube and Twitter. Thanks!

Post at http://learnfinancialeducation.com/

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

How Ford bounced back

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 17:08:00 +0000

April 12, 2012: 7:54 AM ET

Article from CNN Money

Our Weekly Read column features Fortune staffers' and contributors' takes on recently published books about the business world and beyond. We've invited the entire Fortune family -- from our writers and editors to our photo editors and designers -- to weigh in on books of their choosing based on their individual tastes or curiosities. In this installment, senior editor-at-large Alex Taylor reviews American Icon: Alan Mulally and the fight to save Ford Motor Company, by Bryce Hoffman.

FORTUNE -- As a longtime follower of the auto industry, I am addicted to books that promise the inside skinny about the personalities behind the products. When a new tome arrives in the mail, I scour it for inside dope, untold stories, and back-room gossip that will unwrap another layer of this fascinating and complex business. Full disclosure: I also peek at the index to see if Fortune has been quoted.

At the moment, my bookshelf runneth over. The upturn in industry fortunes that followed the bankruptcies of Chrysler and General Motors (GM) has provided an irresistible story arc of near-death, repentance, and revival. Among a number of first-rate accounts that have appeared in the past 24 months, Bryce Hoffman's American Icon: Alan Mulally and the fight to save Ford Motor Company is a standout.

Unable to accommodate a deluge of requests from writers eager to document its revival under Mulally, Ford (F) chose Hoffman, a reporter for the Detroit News, and granted him unique access to tell its story without editorial oversight. It chose wisely. Hoffman has produced a book brimming with smart observations and fresh insights into Ford's success. (Another disclosure: Both Fortune and I are mentioned, briefly, in the book).

The outlines of the Ford turnaround are well known by now. Family scion Bill Ford lured Mulally, a former Boeing (BA) executive, to Detroit in 2006 after being rebuffed by two more experienced leaders. Mulally reshaped the company by dropping lines like Volvo and Mercury and focusing on one global Ford brand. He built a team of like-minded executives through persistence, persuasion, and force of personality.

"Ford's executives finally stopped making decisions based on what was best for their own careers and started trying to figure out what was best for the company as a whole," Hoffman writes. "That was something that had never happened before in Dearborn and it was the key to Ford's phenomenal resurgence."

At first telling, Mulally comes off like a character from a Preston Sturges movie, all "aw shucks" and "gee whiz." But behind the smiles, Hoffman reveals a toughness in Mullaly that surfaces when dissenters threaten his carefully-nurtured atmosphere of collegiality.

When one executive refused to follow his direction, Mulally simply eliminated his job. He pushed another manager into early retirement because he played badly with others. Hoffman also reports that Mulally withstood a threat from Americas president Mark Fields to quit when Fields was challenged over the use of a company airplane. Mulally stood his ground but didn't hold a grudge. Fields is now the clear favorite to succeed him whenever the 66-year-old decides to retire.

Hoffman also provides a full account of a long-rumored rift in the Ford family that surfaced in the early months of Mulally's tenure. With their dividends suspended and family jewels Jaguar and Land Rover headed for the auction block, dissidents members -- notably Bill Ford's sister and brother-in-law -- consulted with the boutique investment bank Perella Weinberg about ways to monetize their holdings, which included selling control of the company.

Bill and his cousin Edsel beat back the effort and placed their faith in Mulally. They were rewarded with a spectacular turnaround. After losing $14.6 billion in 2008, Ford snapped back and went on to make a $7.8 billion profit in 2011.

The long hours that Hoffman evidently spent with Mulally reveal a man with few flaws, except that he likes to beat everybody into the office by arriving at 5:30 a.m. But this is not hagiography. Hoffman doesn't try to finesse Mulally's ample compensation, which became an issue in labor contract negotiations. (Mulally made $29.5 million in 2011 -- the biggest Detroit payday since Lee Iacocca got $23.6 million from Chrysler in 1986). He's also made good use of his access to dig into previously neglected topics, like the protracted 2009 negotiations required to extract concessions from the United Auto Workers.

Hoffman has a good ear for dialogue and a thorough knowledge of the industry, though he sometimes resorts to clichés when dealing with less familiar topics. Describing Bill Ford's background, for instance, he writes that Ford grew up in a "posh enclave" and attended a "prestigious" school, yet was "down-to-earth" enough to "rub elbows with the common man."

The fortunes of American auto companies tend to rise and fall with the GDP, and Ford follows its own cycle of good and lean years. "Ford's history is a long list of stunning successes followed by epic failures, of against -- all -- odds comebacks that turn into retreats back into mediocrity and mismanagement," writes Hoffman.

The company still has weak spots. Ford has been slow getting to China, U.S. market share is falling, and its first two global cars (Fiesta and Focus) have failed to excite. The true test of Mulally's tenure will be whether the changes he has put in place -- data-driven management, consistent application of agreed-upon principles, teamwork -- survive him. If Mulally ever gets around to retiring -- say around 2015 -- I look forward to adding Hoffman's sequel to my bookshelf.

Article from CNN Money

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

"Money To Start A Business" by Expert Marketer and Investor Perry Belcher Is the Focus of a New Marketing Campaign from Shoestring Publishing.

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 19:34:00 +0000

PRWeb

Published 08:55 a.m., Monday, April 9, 2012

Article from Chron.com

The book is written by Perry Belcher, who has earned more than 100 million dollars profit in his own businesses, consulted with many Fortune 500 companies, and is now an investor.

(PRWEB) April 08, 2012

Shoestring Publishing has launched a new marketing campaign to promote the new book of marketing powerhouse Perry Belcher, who has coached Fortune 500 companies - helping them to earn tens of billions of dollars - and who in his own businesses has earned over 100 million dollars. Marketer-turned-investor Perry Belcher has written a book that will help entrepreneurs find and secure capital for starting a business. There are many great advantages to having investment capital, according to Perry Belcher. "Money To Start A Business" is written for entrepreneurs by an extremely successful entrepreneur who is now also an investor.

According to Justin Douglas of Shoestring Publishing, "Capital to fund your project is always a need for every business owner. Fortunately our startup courses at Shoestring Publishing usually teach you how to start a startup with little or no money of your own. But veteran investor Perry Belcher has made 100 million dollars of his own money selling products and now he is an investor, and in his new book he shares how to find the money to start a business."

Starting a business often requires both knowledge and money, and veteran startup expert Perry Belcher offers knowledge and information about how to fund a startup with his book "Money To Start A Business: How to raise all the money you'll ever need to start your own business." Mr. Belcher has been regarded as one of the top three copy writers in the world and he is now an investor himself. His work raising money for literally hundreds of his own business ventures has given him the insight and experience that he shares in this book.

Mr. Belcher says, "I've bootstrapped a lot of businesses in the past. I've had the privilege of going through the SBA lending process through a partner, I've dealt with venture capital firms; I've dealt with angel investors, private offerings, I even got very near to taking a company public, so I've dealt with pretty much all the stages of financing that you can go through. I've been involved in many startup companies over the past years."

For those entrepreneurs who are serious, Mr. Belcher's book covers most questions and information you will need to have to fund a business. For those who might not be serious, Mr. Belcher does give good advice regarding the potential downside to business ventures. He says "Running a business is hard. Starting a business is harder." Many aspects of accepting outside funding are covered in the book, including the challenges. Mr Belcher says When you're starting a business, having to deal with it, you have a whole other element of reporting and accountability to deal with in an investor or a funding partner. "They're going to be something that takes part of your time. They're actually partners with you now. Once they're investing in your business, they basically become your partner."

"You're going to have to answer to performance milestones if you're dealing with angel investors or venture capital companies, and even a lot of loans. Along your financing path, they're going to want to know how things are going, what's going on. There is going to be a lot of reporting. The more transparent you are with them, the better they're going to feel about you. 'Hey, I'm just too busy,' isn't going to work. More importantly, though, I know what they're not looking for: the reasons people won't loan you money, won't fund your project, or won't invest. Most of the time, this is more important than why they will. If you know their red flags, you have a big advantage."

Mr. Belcher explains that there are reasons to avoid borrowing money or having an investor for starting a stratup. "The reasons why not are twentyfold," he says. "There are a ton of them. When you borrow money from somebody, whether in a loan company, by taking in an investor, even if you just borrow money from rich Aunt Margie: this money comes with strings and sometimes Aunt Margie can be harder to deal with than the venture capital companies."

"You always want to be honest with whoever you're working with," Mr. Belcher says. "I think the biggest problem that I see when most people have conflicts with their lenders or their investors is a lack of transparency, not letting people know what's going on. It's a lack of communication. Angel investors and venture capital investors are what I call 'smart money investors'. A lot of the time what you get from them in money is the smallest part of the deal. They become your partners. All of a sudden you're a partner with somebody who is experienced, who has connections, who knows talented people, who has, in most cases, been there and done that. Most of these people that are working in venture capital funds, especially angel investors (less so venture capital funds, although they all have an element of it), are enterpreneurial. They're usually former entrepreneurs or former business owners, so they were where you are. They understand, so talk to them. Not only will you gain their trust by being transparent and honest with them, you'll probably get the answers to a lot of problems that are just perplexing you."

"There are a lot of reasons you need to raise money, but the biggest reason is the single largest reason businesses fail: under-capitalization," Mr. Belcher says. "Most people who start a business don't have the proper amount of funds to get through the learning curve of the business. Especially if people haven't run a business before; if you're brand-new to something, you're definitely going to have a learning curve. It takes a period of time, typically, to acquire customers, establish vendor relationships, things like that. You're sort of raising money to buy time. A lot of the time you need assets, you need equipment, you need particular things that require tools for your business that you're going to have to raise money for depending on what you're doing. The reason to raise money is to pay for those things in you don't have the money to do it yourself."

Check out the book at its Amazon.com page "Money To Start A Business".

About Shoestring Publishing

Shoestring Publishing is a group of successful entrepreneurs who have created courses for the "average Joe" to be able to start a business in a few days, with little or no startup capital, and with all the training you need in the course. In most cases, the courses can be completed with two days of studying.

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/prweb2012/4/prweb9382373.htm

Article from Chron.com

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

Millionaires share how they amassed their wealth

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 07:19:00 +0000

Fortune tellers

Article from Chicago Tribune

March 30, 2012|By Kimberly Palmer, U.S. News & World Report

Asked about their secrets to success, millionaires don't cite anything magical or rare, but rather the steady application of wise investing strategies, hard work and a degree of frugality.

Here are 10 secrets of millionaires' money management:

Start early to avoid financial pitfalls. Adrian Cartwood, author of the blog "How to Make 7 Million in 7 Years," made his fortune by living frugally while he built his technology-related business. People often get into trouble, he said, by racking up personal debt early on. "Learn how to live within your means and how to delay gratification; these are the habits that you need to maintain on the way up, so you can keep your millions when you get there," he said.

Believe that you can do it. Before investing in real estate and becoming a millionaire, Alan Corey, author of "A Million Bucks by 30," read as many biographies and autobiographies of millionaires as he could find. He said he was searching for a common characteristic that could help him in his own quest. "What I found was they all had an incredible self-belief that they would be financially successful," he said. Corey said embracing that level of self-confidence helped him amass his wealth.

Articulate your vision for success. According to Jen Smith, creator of the Millionaire Mommy Next Door site, the saying "I want to be rich" is too vague. Instead, she recommends imagining what your ideal life as a millionaire will look like. Smith offers this example: "I want to have $2 million invested so that I can live off of the interest. Then I will quit my job so that I can volunteer, travel, learn to play tennis and watercolor, and enjoy picnics at the beach with my family." Smith's vision involved becoming financially successful before becoming a parent. She cut out images from magazines of beautiful places she wanted to visit and people doing fun things and put them near her desk to help her keep that vision in mind.

Insure against life's risks. Bankruptcy is often caused by divorce, a death in the family or a disability that renders someone unable to work. Conversely, protecting against those risks through insurance protects wealth. In "The Quiet Millionaire," financial planner Brett Wilder writes that many people either fail to get adequate insurance or pay too much because they don't understand it.

Work hard — and you'll get lucky. In his new book, "Think Like a Champion," Donald Trump attributes his success to his hard work. Trump says luck comes from working hard. "If your work pays off, which it most likely will, people might say you're just lucky. Maybe so, because you're lucky enough to have the brains to work hard!" he said.

Practice smart budgeting. Smith recommends tracking how much you spend each month. Every month, she said, she downloads her transactions into a spreadsheet to keep her spending on track. Smith also said that, as prosaic as it sounds, maintaining a good credit score is essential to becoming and staying a millionaire. "A good credit score can save you thousands of dollars over the course of your lifetime," she said.

Do what you love. You probably won't excel at something you don't enjoy. That's why Corey recommends going into the field that you find yourself reading about in your spare time. He asks, "Do you read fashion magazines? Get a job in fashion. Do you read gossip blogs? Get a job in celebrity-based enterprises. Do you read Car & Driver? ESPN.com? Yahoo Pets Forum?"

Decide how much money you really want. For many people, $1 million won't be enough. "For most Gen X and Gen Yers, retiring with a couple million when they are 65 won't be anywhere near enough to maintain even an average lifestyle, because that little pup called inflation is constantly nipping at your heels as you try to run toward building your own retirement nest egg," Cartwood said. A more reasonable goal might be $3 million, an amount that Cartwood considers the minimum to be a "bare-bones millionaire" these days. Consider your ideal lifestyle and what you would like to be able to fund. A mortgage of a certain size? Exotic vacations? College tuition for your children? Having a concrete goal in mind makes it easier to get there, said Cartwood.

Invest against the grain. Corey recommends making investment decisions based on the opposite of what everyone else is doing. When stocks are down, anyone buying can get them at a discount. Corey's rule of thumb doesn't just apply to stocks. "Buy a foreclosed house, fill it up with roommates, and you can get a pretty good passive income," he suggests.

Live below your means. Even Eminem, a celebrity and millionaire, scales back his purchases out of frugality. London's Independent newspaper reported that several years ago, as Eminem considered buying a $15,000 watch he liked, he started worrying that he should save his money instead. Eminem reportedly said, "I don't want to run out of money; I want my daughter to be able to go to college." And so far, at least, Eminem hasn't fallen victim to the financial challenges so many other celebrities have faced. On the same note, Smith said even though she's a millionaire, no one would know it, and that's the point. She recommends saving at least 10 to 25 percent of your income. She also suggests avoiding buying "status" items such as fancy sports cars or mansions. After all, bling doesn't make a millionaire; in fact, too much of it can prevent you from becoming one.

Article from Chicago Tribune

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

How to Research Your Business Idea

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 20:26:00 +0000

Your brilliant idea may indeed be brilliant--or it may need some work. Here's how to find out whether you're ready for startup.

BY KAREN E. SPAEDER

Article from The Entrepreneur

The Idea Stage

Analysis

Checking Out the Competition

"I've seen many people launch ideas that I thought were beyond foolish," Keller adds, "but then I learned more about the idea, the customer and the vision-and realized the true risk being taken."

When Your Idea Is Ready to Go

Article from The Entrepreneur

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

How to Get Investors for Your Startup

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 19:41:00 +0000

Raise the money you need by proving to investors that you've done your homework and are willing to sacrifice.

November 21, 2005

The Entrepreneur

I've been working with entrepreneurs now for close to 25 years, and throughout that time one thing hasn't changed: Only 5 percent of all entrepreneurs get funded. Can it be that only 5 percent of the ideas generated are good enough to succeed? Why is it that this "magic" number never seems to change?

I believe there are three fundamental reasons contributing to this impasse. Finding ways to address these issues could significantly improve the flow of viable, creative ideas in this country and have a dramatic impact on our economy.

1. The system for evaluating entrepreneurs is arbitrary and inefficient. When you think about it, the methodology investors employ to find and qualify a potentially viable entrepreneur places almost all the responsibility on the entrepreneur. Once they have an idea, they must take the initiative to package it and promote it all to potentially interested parties. There're two problems with that system:

It's the entrepreneur who decides what information gets presented, and

Everyone who receives this information must process it from a cold start.

To illustrate how ridiculous that system is, it would be the equivalent of you going into a bank to ask for a loan and instead of filling out their application form, you just created your own. How would the banking system operate if everyone made up their own application? What entrepreneurs need is a scoring system similar to the one Venture Alliance uses to determine if you're really ready to get in front of professional investors. It'll also help you find quality resources if you're not. What the system won't do is help you bridge the gap between having a need for capital and actually being ready for it. That part is up to you.

2. Entrepreneurs don't understand the difference between having a need for capital and being ready to ask for it. In a system where the entrepreneur chooses the application, it's not surprising that their timing for when to submit that application is often out of sync with the very investors they're trying to impress. Why? Because entrepreneurs are motivated to seek capital based on need, not readiness. What do I mean by that? Here's the difference. When an entrepreneur is driven by a strong sense of need, the message they send to an investor is one or more of the following:

I need you to bail me out of my bad management of the limited capital I had.
I'm unwilling to invest any more of my money, so I need yours.
I haven't been able to raise money from anyone else, so I need you to save me.

On the other hand, when an entrepreneur has "done their homework" and truly understands what it takes to run a business, the message they send is:

I'm ready for a partner to help me take this to the next level.
I have a handle on my product, my market and my customers, and I'm ready to accept an investment that'll help me grow.
I've researched the various sources of capital available to me and I'm ready to work with you because you're the best match.

Since most entrepreneurs are unwilling or unable to determine when they're truly ready, one goal of a good rating system should be to make that call.

3. Entrepreneurs often struggle over whether to fork over their own money vs. paying someone who won't deliver, leading to a freeze on progress and a slow painful death of their vision. Admittedly, the entrepreneurial industry is flush with charlatans just waiting to take advantage of a vulnerable entrepreneur. However, a far bigger problem is that many entrepreneurs with absolutely stellar ideas simply don't understand that building a business requires tons of sacrifice (including money), and they're just not willing to pay the price. So how do you deal with this conundrum? There are two ways to approach it:

From the investor's perspective: We'll always look for entrepreneurs who demonstrate to us their willingness to "put their money where their mouth is" and who clearly "have skin in the game." If we don't see indications that they believe in their vision enough to invest their own hard-earned cash, then we won't invest either.

From the entrepreneur's perspective: Don't hire anyone without checking their references thoroughly. Talk to previous clients. Be wary of "guarantees." Look for resources that'll take at least part of their reward based on the success of their service. That way, they know they must perform to get paid "the big bucks."

Running your business should be a lot like running your household--you know it's going to cost money and your resources aren't unlimited. So, be prudent on how you invest your limited capital, but realize that an investment is required. Have a plan and follow it as long as it's working. Be flexible, be tough and be open to new ideas. Not every thing will work as you planned.

Jim Casparie is the founder and CEO of The Venture Alliance,a national firm based in Irvine, California, that's dedicated to getting companies funded.

The Entrepreneur

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

Millionaires share how they amassed their wealth

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 08:53:00 +0000

Fortune tellers

Article from The Morning Call

By Kimberly Palmer, U.S. News & World Report

March 30, 2012

Asked about their secrets to success, millionaires don't cite anything magical or rare, but rather the steady application of wise investing strategies, hard work and a degree of frugality.

Here are 10 secrets of millionaires' money management:

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Article from The Morning Call

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

Ex-Investment Banker Pursues a Business Idea from His College Days

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 20:59:00 +0000

By digitizing old photos and videos, ScanDigital turns picture preservation into a profitable business.

BY JOEL HOLLAND | May 24, 2011
Article from The Entrepreneur

Life Preserver: Scandigital Anderson Schoenrock.

Things were good for Anderson Schoenrock when he took a lucrative position with Lehman Brothers after graduating from Dartmouth in 2001. They got better when he partnered with colleagues in 2004 to start a boutique investment firm for commercial real estate; better still when the market boomed from 2004 through 2006; and better once again when Jones Lang LaSalle acquired the company in 2006, leaving Schoenrock with a lucrative package and continuing opportunities for profit.

But Schoenrock, now 32 and CEO of photo scanning company ScanDigital, walked away from all of it in 2007, banking his future on an entrepreneurial idea he'd had since college: to create an easy and versatile method of scanning and converting photos and videos into digital assets that would never deteriorate.

The idea stemmed from a conversation with his college friend--and now co-founder of ScanDigital--Michael Mothner, who was describing his mother's reaction to getting a digital camera. "This is great," she told Mothner, "but how do I take all those photo albums in the garage from the last 20 years and put them on the computer so I have all of my digital photos and old photos together?"

Schoenrock and Mothner researched the market and realized there were millions of people who were sitting on old photos and memories but didn't know how to properly or cost-effectively protect them. Home scanners worked to a degree, but required a lot of time and ultimately didn't produce high-quality results.

"So we set out to create a very easy-to-use, user-friendly service that didn't compromise quality and ensured we were delivering something that would really stand the test of time and preserve these things for generations to come," Schoenrock says.

That was in 2007. ScanDigital has since digitized more than 9 million photos and videos converted from nearly every form of personal media--from slides, negatives and VHS tapes to 8mm and Super 8 reels.

The company helps customers to not only preserve their memories, but also to enjoy, share, edit and interact with them across multiple platforms by offering conversions to online galleries, CDs, DVDs or hard drives.

With 2011 revenues projected at $5 million, one wonders why Schoenrock didn't jump into the entrepreneurial ring right after graduation. College gave him skills and knowledge, but his stint at Lehman taught him endurance.

"One of the real advantages of having worked at an investment bank was that I was consistently working 15- to 16-hour days, which gave me a tremendous work ethic," he says. "By the time I founded ScanDigital, long hours and hard work didn't faze me at all."

Would he recommend his career path to others? "Ultimately, I think you have to do what you think is right in your gut," he says, "and if you have any inclination to start a business, you need to go for it."

This article was originally published in the June 2011 print edition of Entrepreneur with the headline: Valuable Memories.

Article from The Entrepreneur

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

How Buffet Sees The World

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 20:46:00 +0000

Reported by Motley Fool StaffTuesday, March 27, 2012

Article from nine msn finance news

The investing legend that is Warren Buffett recently outlined in a column for Fortune magazine how he categorises possible investments, and Fools would do well to understand this before putting money at risk.

First, a word about risk

And risk is the first thing to understand before going any further. To many in the investment industry, risk is equated with historical volatility, and is measured by beta, the amount the price of a share changes relative to a change in the overall market.

This might be acceptable for a statistician, but not for Buffett; to him, risk is the reasoned probability that an investment will cause its owner a loss of purchasing power over the contemplated holding period.

How the market chooses to value that asset in the meantime is of little consequence to him, as the market has a tendency to mis-price. Thus a volatile asset may be one that he considers low risk, while a stable asset may be hugely risky.

1. Currency-based investments

Currency-based investments, often referred to as ‘fixed-income’ investments, include bank deposits, government gilts and commercial bonds. They are generally thought of as safe, but “in truth they are among the most dangerous of assets. Their beta may be zero, but their risk is huge“.

Even those that reliably pay their interest or coupons as they fall due have destroyed the purchasing power of investors, and are doomed to do so forever. The reason is inflation, and as government determines the ultimate value of money, ‘systemic forces’ will sometimes cause them to produce inflation.

And even a relatively modest rate of inflation in a trusted currency will compound significantly over the years, with the US dollar having lost a staggering 86 percent of its value since 1965. Investors would need to have been earning 4.3% interest tax-free annually from bond investments over that period to simply maintain their value.

In the real world, however, we do pay tax. Buffett takes a rate of 25 percent in his example, so the bonds would need to pay 5.7 percent gross just to keep up, which is coincidentally what continuous rolling of US Treasury bills produced over that 47-year period; considering any of that interest as income would have been a mistake.

“‘In God We Trust’ may be imprinted on our currency, but the hand that activates our government’s printing press has been all too human.”

Over some periods, of course, the interest rate may compensate for inflation, but at current rates he sees no upside, and quotes an old saying from Wall Streeter Shelby Cullom Davis: “Bonds promoted as offering risk-free returns are now priced to deliver return-free risk.”

2. Investments that will never produce anything

Unproductive assets, such as gold and tulips, “are purchased in the buyer’s hope that someone else, who also knows that the assets will be forever unproductive, will pay more for them in the future“.

This type of investment requires an expanding pool of buyers, who, in turn, are tempted because they believe the buying pool will expand still further and will desire the asset even more avidly in the future.

In the case of gold, buyers have a justified fear of paper money, for the reasons outlined above, and their investment thesis depends the ranks of the fearful continuing to increase.

And if you were to take all the gold in the world — a 170,000-tonne cube, 68 feet per side, worth over $9 trillion — it would buy all the cropland in the US (producing an output of about $200 billion annually), 16 Exxon Mobils (NYSE: XOM) — each earning more than $40 billion annually — and still have a few hundred billion left over for spending money.

Those lands and companies will produce earnings every year for the next hundred years, while the block of gold will still be just a block of gold. Which would you rather have?

3. Investment in productive assets

These businesses, farms and property are all examples of productive assets, the sort that Buffett likes. Even businesses with heavy capital requirements can be better than the other two types of investment we looked at, but Buffett’s preference is for businesses with the ability to deliver output that will retain its purchasing-power value in inflationary times while requiring a minimum of new capital investment.

“People will forever exchange what they produce for what others produce,” he says, and a century from now, whatever type of currency we have, he believes people will be willing to exchange a couple of minutes of their labour for a Coca-Cola (NYSE: KO).

With all that in mind, what types of assets would you want to invest in?

If you are looking for ASX investing ideas, look no further than “The Motley Fool’s Top Stock for 2012.” In this free report, Investment Analyst Dean Morel names his top pick for 2012…and beyond. Click here now to find out the name of this small but growing telecommunications company. But hurry – the report is free for only a limited period of time.

Article from nine msn finance news

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

Four Small-Business Lessons from 'The Hunger Games'

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Sun, 25 Mar 2012 19:57:00 +0000

BY KARA OHNGREN | March 23, 2012

The Entrepreneur

Twenty-four “tributes” between ages 12 and 18 are chosen at random from the districts of Panem, a totalitarian state in post-apocalyptic North America, to compete in a barbaric fight for survival. Losing means certain doom, but winning promises a life of luxury. Unless you’ve been asleep in a cave in the ruins of District 13, you’re probably familiar with the plot of the best-selling book series The Hunger Games.

Suzanne Collins’s epic trilogy follows Katniss Everdeen, the fictional 16-year-old who volunteers for the games after her younger sister is chosen as a tribute. To mark the release of the first film in the franchise, we look to Katniss for lessons to be learned about surviving on your own. (Warning: Spoilers abound.) If you follow this guide for your business, perhaps the odds will be ever in your favor.

1. Know your strengths.

“There, resting on a mound of blanket rolls, is a silver sheath of arrows and a bow, already strung, just waiting to be engaged. That’s mine, I think. It’s meant for me.”

Katniss knows her strengths. As a gifted hunter, she realizes there is no one in the arena better with a bow. Likewise, be sure your business plays to your talents and interests. If you have no experience with computers, a tech company probably isn’t your best bet. Create a company in an area where you consider yourself ahead of the competition in experience and know-how -- and you just might survive.

2. Fill a need.

"Sitting on my sleeping bag is a small plastic pot attached to a silver parachute. My first gift from a sponsor! . . . I unscrew the lid and I know by the scent that it’s medicine."

When Katniss’s sponsors see her suffering from terrible burns, they know immediately she will need medicine if she is to survive the night. They spring into action, sending her a soothing ointment to stop her pain. Before you start your new venture, you must identify an unmet need in the marketplace that your company can fill. Take a look around your community and see if there are any wounds on which you can put some entrepreneurial ointment.

3. Master the basics.

". . . he shows us a simple, excellent trap that will leave a human competitor dangling by a leg from a tree. We concentrate on this one skill for an hour until both of us have mastered it."

When training for the arena, Katniss and her fellow tribute and ally, Peeta, opt to skip the more-advanced combat classes in favor of learning survival basics, such as snares and camouflage. This is an important lesson for an entrepreneur. Before starting your own enterprise, learn the basics. Take an entrepreneurship class and pick the brains of other small-business owners in your area. Those early lessons will help prevent easily avoidable and costly mistakes down the road.

4. Be yourself.

"Then I remember Peeta’s words on the roof. '. . .I’m more than just a piece in their Games.'. . . Rue was more than a piece in their Games. And so am I."

At this key moment in the story, Katniss realizes that no matter what the outcome of the Hunger Games, she will be true to herself. So she promotes herself to the audience as not only a great fighter, but also a loyal friend. She chooses to honor her fallen friend Rue rather than flee into the wilderness. This noble action is rewarded with a much-needed gift of bread from Rue’s home district. As an entrepreneur, never be afraid to show your true self. Potential customers respond to a business they can relate to. So, if you’re young and hip, flaunt it. If your business is socially conscious, let it show. And like Katniss, you will be rewarded.

The Entrepreneur

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

A stock tip from 50 Cent? Listen up

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:42:00 +0000

1/17/2011 2:03 PM ET|By Jason Notte, TheStreet
Article from The MSN Money

The rapper tweeted, investors jumped, and a penny stock soared. Turns out they may have had good reason to follow him. His investments have been as dope as his rhymes.

Using Twitter to pump a penny stock in his portfolio doesn't make hip-hop businessman 50 Cent more than a novelty in the financial world. That so many people apparently took his advice does.

Days after 50 Cent flirted with market malfeasance and SEC scrutiny by using his Twitter account to encourage 3.8 million followers to invest in H&H Imports (HNHI 0.00%, news) -- the company that produces his Sleek line of headphones, for which he holds roughly 7.5 million shares and warrants for more than 20 million more -- the question isn't why he would do such a thing. It's why investors would go along with it, boosting H&H stock's value by nearly 300% (or more than $50 million) in one day and extending 50 Cent's influence from MTV and BET to CNBC.

The smarmy answer is that he's a celebrity and the lemmings will jump off any cliff he points to. But the truth is Curtis Jackson, aka 50 Cent, has been right about these sorts of investments before.

From pocket change to mogul

It's been more than half a decade since 50 Cent's only job title was "rapper" -- and even longer since his resume included "crack dealer" -- and his extracurricular business dealings have arguably influenced his brand as much as his 2003 debut album "Get Rich or Die Tryin'" and the single "In da Club," or its multiplatinum follow-up "The Massacre" and tracks such as "Candy Shop" and "Just A Lil' Bit." In 2003, following in the footsteps of Def Jam Records founder Russell Simmons and his Phat Farm clothing line and rapper/producer Sean "Diddy" Combs' Sean John label, 50 Cent teamed up with designer Marc Ecko to launch his G-Unit Clothing line.

Two years later, he licensed himself and his G-Unit crew to former Vivendi Universal video game company and now-dormant Activision Blizzard (ATVI -0.20%, news) subsidiary Sierra Entertainment for "50 Cent: Bulletproof" -- a "Grand Theft Auto"-style run-and-gun game for the Sony (SNE -1.12%, news) PlayStation and Microsoft (MSFT +0.05%, news) Xbox that eventually yielded the Middle East-based war games follow-up "50 Cent: Blood on the Sand" released by THQ (THQI -1.81%, news). (Microsoft publishes MSN Money.)

That same year, 50 Cent starred in his first feature film, the semi-autobiographical "Get Rich or Die Tryin'," spawning film production companies G-Unit Films in 2007 and Cheetah Vision in 2009 -- the latter of which secured $200 million in funding last year and released its 50 Cent-starring first film "Gun."

Dan Charnas, a hip-hop journalist who wrote for The Source and is the author of "The Big Payback: The History of the Business of Hip-Hop," says hip-hop's do-it-yourself ethic itself deserves much of the credit for 50 Cent's early successes and for the accomplishments of fellow hip-hop entrepreneurs such as Combs (whose holdings include Diageo's (DEO -0.24%, news) Ciroc vodka), Akon (Konvict Clothing and a sweet PepsiCo (PEP -0.14%, news) endorsement), Dr. Dre (Aftermath Records and the Beats by Dr. Dre headphone line) and Ludacris (Conjure cognac and endorsement deals for Tag body spray and Trojan condoms).

"One of the reasons that hip-hop was able to come in from the outside and suddenly find itself as the world's predominant pop culture and a multimillion-dollar business is the specific nature of what hip-hop represents in the American context," Charnas says. "If you are shut out of regular institutions, then you have to create your own . . . if corporate America won't give you endorsement deals, then you might have to create your own companies."

Or your own opportunities.

An $80 million investment score

The transaction that transcended 50 Cent's hip-hop persona and eventually separated him from a crowd of drink-endorsing, bad-movie-making hip-hop entrepreneurs was his purchase of a 10% stake in Glaceau, the beverage company he worked with to produce an energy drink. When the company was sold to Coca-Cola in 2007, 50 Cent took home $80 million and went from "hip-hop entrepreneur" to businessman with investment ideas that could move markets.

"Wall Street moves real money, but a lot of it is a game of perception, and I think that perception means a lot," Charnas says. "Fifty's not the most wealthy person, but he's able as a thought leader and a legend in terms of what he's been able to do with himself to move the needle a bit."

That influence placed 50 Cent in the rare company of entrepreneurs such as Simmons and Jay-Z, who once dismissed him with the lyric "I'm about a dollar, what the (expletive) is 50 Cents?"

Despite a similar crack-dealing back story as 50 Cent -- minus the bullet wounds -- Jay-Z went about building Roc-A-Fella Records and the Rocawear clothing label from the ground up (and selling it for $204 million in 2007). He later became president of Def Jam. His Armadale line of vodkas, 40/40 Club sports bars, role as Anheuser-Busch InBev (BUD -0.65%, news) co-brand director for Budweiser Select and stake in the New Jersey Nets helped fill out the index of his autobiography, "Decoded," which went to the New York Times best-seller list last year, when he earned $63 million -- nearly eight times 50 Cent's take.

It also got him a seat at the table with Warren Buffett and Steve Forbes for the Forbes 400 summit in October and moved the goal posts of hip-hop business from merely rich to real wealth.

"It was hip-hop culture, and the power of it, that allowed black entrepreneurs to transform themselves like Jay-Z, who was a low-level crack dealer just trying to get some money in the late 1980s and is now a guy who can play among the ultrarich and sit among them and be accepted among them," Charnas says. "It's a great symbolic gift. And if Jay and 50 can transform their personal fortunes into something more duplicable that brings more lasting wealth -- companies that last for decades rather than years -- then it will be more than symbolic."

Article from The MSN Money

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

10 ideas that each made $100 million

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 19:42:00 +0000

These entrepreneurs took simple ideas and successfully converted them into booming businesses.

By Michelle Fox, CNBC.com

Article from MSN Money

A lucky few

Larry Ellison, Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg usually come to mind when people think about those who have cashed in on an idea, but you don’t have to live in Silicon Valley to turn a business concept into wealth.

Chances are, just about anyone you talk to will have an idea for a business that one day may make that person millions of dollars. A lucky few entrepreneurs with simple ideas and humble beginnings have managed to convert their ideas into booming businesses.

So what does it take to make $100 million? You may be surprised:

Spanx

One night, Sara Blakely cut off the bottom off her pantyhose, and the idea for Spanx was born.

Blakely researched and wrote a patent for footless pantyhose, then drove around North Carolina visiting textile mills in search of one that would turn her design into a product. Most told her it would never sell, but one mill owner decided to take a chance and help turn her "crazy idea" into reality.

Within three months, Blakely sold more than 50,000 items from her apartment. She also started pitching her product to high-end department store buyers. Now that "crazy idea" has Blakely soaring. Spanx has grown to include a full range of body-slimming undergarments, bathing suits and activewear.

1-800-Got-Junk?

Inspiration struck Brian Scudamore as he was waiting in line at a McDonald's drive-through and the pickup truck of a local hauling company caught his eye. Scudamore went out and bought his own pickup for $700 and started the Rubbish Boys. He began by picking up junk between classes at the University of British Columbia, but what started as a way to pay for college soon turned into something bigger.

In 1993, he dropped out of school to focus on the company. In 1998, he changed the name to 1-800-GOT-JUNK? A year later, the first franchise opened in Canada. Now there are locations all over North America and Australia.

Pillow Pets

The idea for Pillow Pets dawned on Jennifer Telfer as she watched her young sons smash down their stuffed animals in order to sleep on them. So she set about creating stuffed animals that unfolded into plush pillows.

Telfer and her husband decided to wholesale the products themselves through their company, CJ Products. She began by hawking them at a mall kiosk during the holiday season, and then at a home show two weeks after Christmas.

When the products nearly sold out, Telfer realized she was onto something. The cuddly toy has since exploded into the marketplace, bringing in $300 million in sales in 2010.

Life Is good

Bert Jacobs and John Jacobs designed their first T-shirts in 1989 and hawked them on the streets of Boston and at colleges along the East Coast. But for five years success eluded the brothers. Then, in 1994, they struck upon the idea to use a design of a cartoon figure called Jake and the motto "Life is good."

People seemed to embrace the simple message. Retailers soon became interested. Now, Jake's face and motto are on more than just shirts -- you can find Jake and other characters smiling from towels, totes, coffee mugs, dog leashes and other products. The business is booming, with 2010 sales coming in at about $100 million.

Boston Beer

The beer business is in Jim Koch's blood. His father was a fifth-generation brewer, but he left the business as the big brewers embraced mass production. In 1984, Koch felt people were starting to crave something different. He left his job as a management consultant, dug out his great-great grandfather's recipe and started brewing beer in his kitchen.

Once his sample brew was perfected, Koch took it to Boston's bars, trying to persuade the owners to carry Samuel Adams Boston Beer Lager. Today, Boston Beer (SAM) is the nation's largest craft-beer brewer. It's also a moneymaker, posting $102.2 million in net revenue in the first quarter of 2011.

Chipotle Mexican Grill

Steve Ells was working as a chef in San Francisco when he decided he wanted to open his own restaurant. He found his inspiration in the taco shops he used to frequent in the city. Ells decided he wanted a burrito restaurant that was different from a typical fast food experience.

After borrowing money from his parents, he opened his first Chipotle in Denver, in 1993. It was so successful that he abandoned his "real dream" of opening a full-scale restaurant. Today, there are more than 1,000 restaurants in the Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG) chain.

Method

The idea for an environmentally friendly household cleaner came to Adam Lowry and Eric Ryan when they were roommates in a San Francisco apartment. They noticed that when it came time to clean up from their house parties, the products they used would make them cough. This made them wonder whether the products they were using were dirtier than the messes they were trying to clean.

At the time, there weren’t many cleaning products that didn’t contain harsh chemicals. So Lowry and Ryan did some research and launched Method, a line of home-care products.

Ten years later, the products are sold in stores across the country.

Burt's Bees

Burt Shavitz was selling honey from the back of his pickup truck, and Roxanne Quimby was an out-of-work waitress trying to make a living at flea markets and yard sales when they met, in 1984. They collaborated to make candles from beeswax to sell at craft fairs and stores.

The business took off when Quimby found a 19th-century book of homemade personal-care recipes. They started cooking up natural soaps and perfumes on gas stoves. Their best-selling idea came in the form of lip balm, which they added to the product line in 1991.

Burt’s Bees now sells more than 100 skin- and hair-care items but no longer makes candles. The company’s sales topped $250 million in 2007, and Clorox (CLX) ponied up $925 million to buy the company at the end of that year.

1-800-Flowers

Jim McCann was a bartender and social worker who was looking for a way to supplement his income when he bought a flower shop for $10,000 in 1976. He eventually opened 13 more stores in the New York area, but it wasn't until he hit upon the idea to acquire the 1-800-FLOWERS phone number that business really bloomed, in 1986.

The company was the first to put an 800 telephone number in its name. McCann made sure technology didn’t leave him behind, seizing an Internet opportunity as early as 1991.

In 1999, 1-800-FLOWERS (FLWS) went public and added the dot-com to its name. The company, which has also expanded by acquiring companies such as the Popcorn Factory and Fannie May, reported almost $668 million in revenue in fiscal 2010.

Curves

Gary and Diane Heavin opened their first Curves in 1992 with the idea of targeting women who felt they were not being served by conventional gyms. The Heavins' idea was to create a place that would give women a supportive and comfortable atmosphere. The couple also focused on busy women’s time constraints by introducing a 30-minute-fitness concept.

The club caught on, and the business expanded. Now there are nearly 10,000 locations around the globe, which generated $1 billion in revenue last year.

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Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

Branding 101: Five Tips for Solopreneurs

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 20:42:00 +0000

BY CAROL TICE| March 12, 2012|
Article from The Entrepreneur

Strong branding is critical in our ad-cluttered world. After all, you want to ensure that you're the first provider in your niche that comes to customers' minds.

But what if your brand is, well, just you? How can you be memorable and stand out?

Never fear -- solopreneurs can have snappy branding, too. Here's a quick guide and some examples of one-person businesses that have great, memorable brands:

Make it visual. Simple branding is best, especially if you can make an association in people's minds that helps them remember you. Two of my local realtors are Ed Aro and Penny McLaughlin. You guessed it -- Ed's logo is an arrow, and Penny's is a one-cent piece with her face on it in profile instead of Lincoln. Penny has had so much success with her brand that she grew into a real-estate empire with eight brokers, a.k.a. "Penny's Team." Their trucks are often seen around town, with that familiar penny logo on the side.

Be sure it's tweetable. Social media is increasingly important in coming up with your brand concept. Look what happened to Netflix when they didn't check if their chosen spinoff brand name, Qwikster, was available on Twitter. It turned out to be already taken by someone who wanted to post about their drug use. When you're choosing a brand name, consider how and whether it would work in social media.

Have fun. Some of my favorite solopreneur brands have humorous or whimsical elements. For instance, a proofreader and writing-consultant friend of mine, Stefanie Flaxman, is the Revision Fairy -- check out her cool cartoon. And franchise expert Joel Libava is the Franchise King, down to posing with a red-velvet-and-gold crown (once again, great visual). What better way to instantly communicate that he's the top expert in his field?

Make sure it fits. If the entrepreneurs I've cited above were uncomfortable with the brands they've created, their brands would flounder. You may be living with this brand for a long time, so don't go with a brand concept that embarrasses you. Customers will sense that, and you won't promote your brand as enthusiastically.

Be consistent. Once you've come up with your branding, you want to use it everywhere. Get new business cards, magnet signs for your car, stationery and a new sign for your store. Don't leave any of your old, less-awesome branding lurking around to confuse people.

Article from The Entrepreneur

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

How to Make Daily Deals Pay Off For Your Business

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Sat, 17 Mar 2012 19:23:00 +0000

BY JEFF SLUTSKY | Yesterday

Article from The Entrepreneur

Groupon went public in November, and LivingSocial and more locally based coupon sites are also flooding email inboxes with daily deals.

Online coupons can be a great way to find new customers because they cost a business owner only if someone actually uses them. Business owners, however, have to be careful with this powerful marketing tool. As a marketing consultant who frequently works with entrepreneurs, I tell them, "If you don't structure this opportunity right, it might run you under."

You can ruin your business as you're flooded with sales that you're losing money on. Business owners also fail to take advantage of the opportunity to sell other products and basically upsell off the deal.

I recently purchased an $80, one-room paint job through LivingSocial that was supposed to cost $250. Considering the cost of the paint was added in, it was a really good price.

The owner of the paint franchise persuaded me that she could provide me a reasonable price for painting other rooms in my house – about $1,000-worth of work. But I haven't heard from her since about it. The way online couponing sites work, she may received only $40, with LivingSocial pocketing the other $40.

I'm guessing that her business was overwhelmed with responses from the coupon, and therefore missed the chance to make money off of me. A wasted opportunity.

The problem with online couponing is that most business owners don't know how to structure the daily deal right, or they have the wrong strategy in using the coupons.

Here are some things you should do to make sure your leap into online coupons is a successful one:

Track the results. On each sale, record how much customers purchased above the amount of the certificate and whether the coupon users are first-time or repeat buyers. Doing so will help you measure whether the coupon helped your business and is worth trying again.

Figure out how much a new customer is worth to you. On average, how many first-time customers become regular customers for your business? Let's say it's one out of four. And then how much is a regular customer worth? Let's say a restaurant defines regular customers as people who stop in 30 times a year, and they pay an average $10 on a bill, with the eatery making a $5 profit on each bill. (Not unusual for a quick-service establishment.) That means each regular customer is worth $300 a year in gross sales and $150 in annual gross profit. A Groupon coupon that costs your business $150 in lost profits needs to bring in four new customers in order to make up for what you gave away.

Prepare for an influx of customers. Get an influx of customers and disappoint them, and you may be out of business six months later. Don't be like the painting company that I bought the coupon for. Make sure you have the staff and resources in place to offer the best service possible in order to turn those first-time customers into regular customers. Make sure that your employees recognize that a customer with a coupon deserves service that is just as good, if not better, than a customer without a coupon. And they should try to upsell extra products or services to them.

Make sure the coupon customers are the right ones for you. There's an upscale restaurant I was recently working with that wanted to engage in online coupons out of desperation. People who are interested in using Groupon in your area might not be the upscale restaurant type of people. Ask the online coupon site for demographics of its local users so you can make sure the people using the website's coupons are the type of customers you want.

Also, use online daily deals sparingly, because you don't want regular customers to become used to the coupon prices.

You may own a small business, but online couponing sites are now having challenges finding really good local businesses with attractive deals to keep them going. If you have a good business, they need you as much as you need them. So get the most you can out of them.

Article from The Entrepreneur

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.

Six Tips to Turn Your Passion into Profit

ridodirected@gmail.com (RIDO) — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 20:39:00 +0000

BY NANCY MANN JACKSON | March 6, 2012
Article from The Entrepreneur

After exploring more than 40 countries recreationally, Joe Reynolds decided it was time to turn his love of adventure into his day job. With just $5,000 he launched the first-ever Great Urban Race, a wild metropolitan quest, during which teams solve clues and complete mental and physical challenges while discovering their city in a fresh way.

In five years, Reynolds, along with partner Ryan Kunkel, has parlayed his initial investment into Red Frog Events, a Chicago-based company with more than 60 full-time employees, three signature extreme races and a serious following.

The company's most popular event, Warrior Dash, a 5K race packed with obstacles like a pond filled with logs, a rock wall, a tunnel of flames and a sinking mud pit, made appearances in 35 cities across the country in 2011 and drew 600,000 participants. This year the company is going international for the second time, taking its events to Ireland and Great Britain. Revenue has grown from $50,000 in 2007 to a projected $85 million in 2012.

"We've had a tremendously successful start over the past four and a half years, but we continue to be excited about what will come next," Reynolds says. "When you're really passionate about your business, you can see lots of tremendous opportunities."

Reynolds had previously owned a house-painting company, but he admits he had no idea how to contend in the event-production business. What he did know was that he loved competing and creating fun experiences--and he wanted to share his passion with the masses. With hard work and dedication, he's now doing just that.

If, like Reynolds, you'd like to turn what you love into a viable business enterprise, start with these six tips.

1. Don't count on passion alone.

While enthusiasm is a great place to start, it's not enough to sustain your business for the long term. Before launching your business, do a reality check and make sure you have the other components needed for success, such as a willingness to work hard and a market for your services or products.

"Sometimes passion can blind you to the potential downside of your idea," says John Torrens, a serial entrepreneur and an entrepreneurship professor at Syracuse University. "The one non-negotiable factor for any sustainable business is that they solve a problem for a specific customer segment in a way that is appreciably better than the next best alternative. Get as much feedback from potential customers as possible. No matter how great you think the idea is, you still need to understand what your market thinks."

Without excitement for your venture, you probably won't be successful, according to Doug White, a small-business consultant and co-author of Let Go to Grow: Why Some Businesses Thrive and Others Fail to Reach Their Potential. However, that alone won't guarantee success. White says would-be entrepreneurs who want to turn their hobbies into a business must be aware of the following things:

Be good at what your business does. "This is probably not an issue if the primary work of the business is your passion," White says. "But we have seen too many people buy a franchise or start a business only to discover that they didn't like or weren't good at the primary work of the business."

Remember the details. There are tons of ancillary functions that go along with running a business that must be performed well for it to succeed. These may include ordering inventory, paying the bills, invoicing customers, keeping the books, sweeping the floor, marketing and selling. "You will need a plan for accomplishing these tasks," White says. "You can do them yourself if you have the inclination and the skill set. You can outsource them if the cash flow of the business will allow that. Or, you could take on a partner to perform some of the functions."

Dole out responsibility. When the business grows, you'll have a choice to make: You'll either have to delegate the primary work to others, or you may choose to delegate managing the operation to someone else so you can continue to focus on the primary work yourself.

2. Hire passionate people.

Most new hires get a job at Red Frog Events through the company's internship program, and there are approximately 150 applicants for every internship position. "If you go through our application process and our internship program, we know you're passionate about the job, the company and about life," Reynolds says.

Having employees who share your zeal for the business will help your company succeed. For instance, at the Warrior Dash Louisiana in 2010, a series of tornadoes tore through the landscape during the event. "We had to shut down mid-event and there were some moments of chaos," Kunkel says. But the storms didn't stop the race. Neither Reynolds nor Kunkel were in Louisiana, but the staffers who were managing the race stayed up through the night to repair the course and get all the obstacles ready again, so the competitors who weren't able to finish could complete the course the following day.

By hiring others who share your devotion, you'll be able to trust the business to your employees as it grows, rather than insisting on having your hands in every endeavor.

3. Share your passion.

If you have a hobby, likely there are others out there who share that interest and would like to learn more about it. Sharing your knowledge can be a great way to build your business, says Katie Weber, who quit her job in 2001 to turn her feng shui hobby into a consulting business. She started by launching an e-mail newsletter, the Red Lotus Letter: Feng Shui for Wealth, which helped establish her name in the field.

"People would forward my e-mails and I'd get new sign-ups," Weber says. "And at meetings, I could offer free content to anyone I met." After launching with 22 names in September 2001, Weber's e-zine has grown to more than 15,000 subscribers and earned her $200,000 last year.

4. Keep the passion alive.

Once your business gets going, you can become mired in the daily tasks of running a company and watch your original excitement dry up. "Keep your passion alive by staying involved in the aspects you love most," says Alan Hall, founder of DooBizz, a free resource that offers online lessons in entrepreneurship. "Spending too much time on repetitive tasks you can delegate to others will ultimately dampen your enthusiasm and end up burning you out. Remember the elements you loved most at the start of your business, such as creating a new design or a product or meeting new customers in hobbyist groups, and make a conscious effort to include at least some of those activities in your ongoing role. Otherwise, your work will turn into a form of drudgery that may kill your passion for the original hobby."

Reynolds and Kunkel make a point to continue competing in races themselves so they can maintain their love for running and recreation. That fervor that fueled the company's launch also allows the co-founders to free themselves from some of the pressures that often accompany entrepreneurship. Rather than feeling responsible for thinking of everything and micromanaging their employees, Reynolds and Kunkel empower their staffers to develop solutions to their own problems. Three times each year, every employee is encouraged to come up with a list of "bottlenecks," or things that hinder them from doing their jobs to the best of their ability. After the last round of bottleneck lists, Reynolds and Kunkel incorporated 40 immediate changes, such as altering a customer service policy and providing some workers with their own printers.

5. Prioritize fun.

Naturally, entrepreneurs who start businesses based on their interests find their business to be fun, but keeping it fun takes a bit of work, Syracuse University's Torrens says. "There's a palpable difference between companies that have a culture led by a truly passionate entrepreneur and those that use passion and fun as sales and recruiting gimmicks," he says. "In the authentically passionate companies, everything grows from that passion, including the people, policies, branding and community relations. That obsessive focus on whatever it is that gets you out of bed can't be faked, but it takes work to create the circumstances under which it can thrive. Maintaining primacy of mission and having the strength to stay on course and avoid distractions is critical."

At Red Frog Events, Reynolds and Kunkel have worked hard to create a positive culture. Company perks include unlimited vacation days; full health, vision, life and dental insurance; regular free food and drinks (including beer on tap); and a summer-camp-theme office complete with a treehouse, tepees and a hammock.

"Three times a year we shut down the office after lunch, unexpectedly, for a staff field trip," Reynolds says. "We play rooftop games like broom ball or take boat cruises on Lake Michigan. It's important to turn off the work mode occasionally and get to know each other and really enjoy the passionate people we have working with us."

In addition to making work fun for employees, it's important to make your own job as the boss as enjoyable as possible. Reynolds and Kunkel get excited about new ideas and new product launches, so for them it's fun to hear their employees' fresh ideas for the company. Three times a year, they hold an internal business plan competition. "We get a flood of fresh ideas we could launch in the future," Kunkel says. "And it's fun for employees, too: The prize is free lunches for a month."

6. Expand your passion.

When you start a business based on a personal interest, it can be easy to assume that the business must remain on the same track to maintain your dedication. But the most successful entrepreneurs understand that change is good and that there may be more than one way to meet your original goals.

Reynolds launched Red Frog Events because he wanted to combine his love for adventure travel and competitive runs. But over the past five years, he and Kunkel have realized they are excited about producing recreational events in general, not just runs. This year they plan to enter the music festival industry, starting with their own Firefly Music Festival, which they hope will compete with some of the world's largest such events. "Every decision we make isn't for this week or next week or next year, but for 20 years down the road," Kunkel says. "Building a sustainable company requires ongoing reinvention and new development."

They've experienced a tremendously successful start, and Reynolds and Kunkel say they're looking forward to what's next. Always open to new ideas, Reynolds says they're seeing a lot of opportunities for growth in different directions: "You have to be willing to stretch and grow in ways you may not have imagined at the beginning."

This article was originally published in the March 2012 print edition of Entrepreneur's StartUps with the headline: Six Tips to Turn Your Passion into Profit.

Article from The Entrepreneur

Turn the hopelessness within you into a fruitful opportunity.