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Archive for the ‘Business’ Category

Everyone of us dreamed of having their own home. A place where you and your family could spend some quality time and bonding. Fortunately, the technology has made its own way to help people made their search fast and easy with the use of the internet. The internet provides a lot of sites to visit whether you are looking for marchés publics, construction maison en bois ecologique and even maintien à domicile, you will surely find the best with its help.

One of the most popular kind of business enterprise most people venture in , is food. People love to eat, and if you are known to provide the best food, customer service, matched up with superior restaurant equipment and supplies, your success as a restaurant owner will be guaranteed. Good food is just one factor to consider in making your restaurant a success, providing the right ambiance and customer service should also be considered. If you think about, some restaurants have various ways of entertaining customers, why? Because this will keep them company while you prepare their orders!

In delivering quality service, your restaurant should be fully equipped with the equipments and restaurant supplies that will help you store and cook food, fast and easy! Adequate storage is important to keep spoils from happening. Keep in mind that when people are hungry they do not like to wait! And to guarantee that your food supplies have a longer shelf life, you should have the best storage equipments like refrigerators and chillers! And with a gas range that can make it possible for you to cook various meals at the same time, you will be able to serve your customer faster and more efficiently! Although it is the quality of the food that really counts, having the right equipments and supplies can make your food service more efficient! Time of service, food quality and ambiance are three crucial factors we need to pass, since these will determine whether or not your restaurant will be successful. And thanks to online companies that provides us with superior restaurant equipment and supplies, service time is guaranteed to pass the test! Since time is no longer an issue, you can focus on coming up with delicious tasting food and create that perfect ambiance, to make your customers come back for more!

Our children are full of energy! From the moment they wake up, they play and explore all day! Just to think about, most of us can’t even keep up with their energy! It even makes me wonder where they get this kind of energy from. Then, I came up with a simple answer, kids sleep an at average of 10 hours a day, and not only that, they also take naps in between! With sleep they are able to re-energize for more hours of playtime!

Since sleep and nap time are very important in our child’s life, we have to make sure that they have that well-deserved and much needed rest that they need. And for small bundles of energy, getting them a crib bedding and baby bedding is very important! With the comfort it will provide them, they can instantly fall asleep when they want to! For our kids that love to run about and play all day, a kids bedding will surely help soothe and calm them, making bed time and naptime a fun experience for them! With the right beddings, that are quality, durable and stylish as well, our children will be looking forward to their bed time and nap time!

Diversifying into new product lines is necessary to keep up with new market trends, especially in clothing. Also, new products like beverages and even cell phones ignite these market trends that make for a good investment opportunity. However, increased diversity to cover such trends requires a corresponding increase in capital. Money that is often hard to come by. Thus, Small Business Financing can be the answer.

A Small Business Finance of US$10,000 with 20% interest for payment duration of a full year produces a net payable of US$12,000 or US$1,000 per month or just US$250 per week. Thus, 50 new cell phone costing US$200 can be bought wholesale for the US$10,000 loan amount and can be sold retail for US$250. Since there are 52 weeks in a year, all the 50 phones have a good chance of all being sold for a total net sales US$12,500 or US$500 net profit. Note that if the trend allows sales of 2 cell phones a week regularly, the same US$10,000 can be used to purchase 100 phones, in two batches, for total sales of US$25,000 with a payable of only US$12,000 at year end, arriving at a grand profit of US$13,000. Thus, loans can really be put work to make more money. Loans such as personal loans as well as Business Finance, can be availed of from some internet sites.

Sharepoint is defined in Microsoft terms as ”integrated suite of server capabilities for Enterprise Search, content management, business process facilitation, simplified information sharing and greater business insight.” This means that you do things differently, which helps you to save a lot of your time and energy. It provides an integrated single platform to manage intranet, extra-net and Internet applications across the enterprise.

Do you get full control over storage, security, distribution, management in managing their electronic contents? They make use of tools which are really easy to use to include the familiar, everyday applications.

By using the Info Path forms solutions service-driven organizations, it can accelerate their joint business processes with customers and partners in their organizations over the border. Through information sharing facilities and simplified content publishing, you can find data, information and people easier to accurately efficiency. Back baseline data is easily accessible using the browser and personalization data is easy to do. You will have more time on strategic activities that all management and deployment management system topic at hand by making use of powerful tools. It help by reading the responsibilities of the various file-sharing and content management. It takes content from multiple places and put it in a centralized warehouse with consistent categorization. It reduces the workload of employees, partners and customers as now, the relevant information is easily available and no need to find it from a wide range of repositories and formats. It makes you increase your productivity and profits.

If you are looking for a way to make money  with your blogs through adsense revenue sharing, then you should definitely try posting your blogs at YouSayToo!  It is being run by Google Inc., where bloggers can generate revenue on pay-per-click basis or per impressions. Website owners can also enroll in this program enabling text, imaging, and video advertisements on their website!

At YouSayToo, bloggers can post ads about anything under the sun! Whatever they feel like posting they can do so! Internet users can even find HUD apartments for rent that are suitable for low income families, students, elderly, and such!  There also ads like a new hotel Dubai where you can have a luxurious time at a 7-star hotel!  You can even see what your baby might look like with pictures of you and your partner, and make your future baby with baby morphing! And how about games? AT YouSayToo, there are also various games you can read about and play great flash games like monkey defense! At YouSayToo bloggers can earn money by just simply posting their blogs or write-ups, and the more visitors click your ads, the more revenue you’ll get! Thus the key is making catchy ads to attract potential guests!

Buyer behavior differs among nations and often among market segments within a country. Marketers must carefully match their marketing strategies to local customs, tastes, and living conditions. Even McDonald’s decided to tweak its standard hamburger fare to cater to diverse international tastes. The world’s largest fast-food marketer offers vegetarian burgers in parts of India; some Australian outlets include beets as a condiment; beer can be purchased in German outlets; and wine is on the menu in French McDonald’s restaurants.
The Coca-Cola Company, which generates 63 percent of sales and 75 percent of total profits from international markets, varies its product emphasis in different parts of the world. In
Japan, it heavily promotes Leaf, a new canned-tea product that has become a hot seller there.
The reason for the shift: Soft drinks make up only 20 percent of nonalcoholic beverage sales in Japan. TelePizza is another international venture that adapted its products to local preferences and customs. Founder Leopoldo Fernandez Pujals exemplifies today’s international entrepreneurial ventures. Pujals is Cuban-born, American reared and educated, a Vietnam veteran, and now a businessman based in Madrid, Spain. Ten years ago, Pujals invested $100,000 in savings to launch his new business, TelePizza. Using local teenagers to test his pies, he determined the best combination of ingredients for his market before opening the doors for business. TelePizza now controls 60 percent of Spain’s pizza market and has grown to more than 600 outlets in Europe and South America. Many of his strategies have been based on previous winners in the international fast-food industry—cleanliness from McDonald’s, speedy home delivery from Domino’s, and sit-down comforts from Pizza Hut. Using a centralized delivery service and computerized ordering systems, customers can call one number to order anything from shrimp curry to pizza topped with trout flakes and have it delivered by bicycle to their door.
In some instances, international marketers succeed in changing local buyer behavior by introducing new marketing strategies that have been well-received in other countries. Johnson & Johnson (J&J) recently debuted RoC, a 40-year-old French line of skincare products, in an attempt to leverage its strong European brand. J&J marketers are targeting both the mass- market brand of L’Oreal and prestige department-store brands such as Clinique)Failure to adapt to local preferences can create costly problems, as Kellogg cereal marketers can attest. Kellogg had enjoyed success in both the United States and England and was eager to expand into other European markets. Lured by expected higher prices and profit margins, cheaper television advertising time, and fewer competitors, Kellogg opened a manufacturing plant in Italy to supply what appeared to be a market with high growth potential. But Italians do not eat corn flakes; they consider corn a product more likely to be fed to livestock; and those few cereal fanciers typically buy from health-food stores. Had Kellogg marketers bothered to check consumption data, they would have known the task they faced. On average, Italians consume 1.1 pounds of cereal annually—hardly a drop in the bucket compared to 11.7 pounds in the United States and 14.5 pounds in Britain. The U.S. firm began making inroads in the land of la Dolce Vita and then began linking its products to Italian food habits. For example, an ad for Crunchy Nut Corn Flakes features an Italian farm family eating breakfast outside their old stone house while their child is talking on a cell phone—an essential part of 21st-century Italian life. Eventually, Kellogg’s market share floated up to 60 percent of Italy’s total dry—cereal sales.
Differences in buying patterns require marketing executives to complete considerable research before entering a foreign market. Sometimes the marketer’s own organization or a U.S.- based research firm can provide needed information. In other cases, only a foreign-based marketing research organization can tell marketers what they need to know. Whoever conducts the research, investigators must focus on six different areas before advising a company to enter a foreign market:
1. Demand. Do foreign consumers need the company’s good or service?
2. Competitive environment. How do supplies currently reach the market?
3. Economic environment. What is the state of the nation’s economic health?
4. Social-cultural environment. How do cultural factors affect business opportunities?
5. Political-legal environment. Do any legal restrictions complicate entering the market?
6. Technological environment. To what degree are technological innovations used by consumers in the market?

Today, it is rare to find a U.S. firm that never ventures outside its domestic market. Even if it deals primarily with the U.S. market, which is huge in its own right, it may look overseas for raw materials or component parts or it may face foreign competition in its home market. Those who venture abroad may find the international marketplace far different than the domestic one they are accustomed to. Market sizes, buyer behavior, and marketing practices all vary. To be successful, international marketers must do their homework, capitalize on similarities, and carefully evaluate all market segments in which they expect to compete.

From the dawn of civilization until the lSOOs, world population grew to about 1 billion people. It almost doubled by 1900, and today over 6 billion people inhabit the planet. According to Census Bureau projections, world population will increase to nearly 8 billion in the next 25 years. Ninety-six percent of the increase in world population occurs in less-developed regions such as Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Population growth rates in affluent countries, however, have slowed to 0.4 percent annually—one fifth the annual growth of less-developed countries. What this all means is that, over the next quarter-century, firms will have to adapt their goods and services to meet the needs and wants of consumers in developing countries.
One-fifth of the world’s population—l.2 billion people—lives in China, for example, but less than one in 20 resides in the United States. Africa is growing fastest at 2.8 percent a year, followed by Latin America at 1.9 percent and Asia at 1.7 percent. Average birth rates are dropping around the world due to family planning efforts, but death rates are declining even more rapidly. However, in Africa the birth rates are still high (6 children per woman), and Indian women average 3.4 children. European birth rates have fallen considerably, and couples average only 1.5 children. This could present economic challenges as the age distribution shifts due to the low birth rate.’4
The world marketplace is increasingly an urban marketplace. Today, almost 50 percent of its people live in large cities. As a result, city populations are swelling: 39 cities currently have a population of 5 million or more. Mexico City, whose population of 18 million ranks it as the world’s largest city; is expected to grow to 31 million by 2010. Increased urbanization will expand the need for transportation, housing, machinery, and services.
The growing size and urbanization of the international marketplace does not necessarily mean all foreign markets offer the same potential. Another important influence on market potential is a nation’s economic development stage. A subsistence economy offers a different environment than that of a newly industrialized country or an industrial nation. In a subsistence economy, most people engage in agriculture and earn low per-capita incomes, supporting few opportunities for international trade. In a newly industrialized counny, such as Brazil or South Korea, growth in manufacturing creates demand for consumer products and industrial goods such as high-tech equipment, The industrial nations, including the United States, Japan, and western Europe, trade manufactured goods and services among themselves and export to less-developed countries. Although these wealthy countries account for just a small percentage of the world’s population, they produce over half of its output.
As a nation develops, an increasingly affluent, educated, and cosmopolitan middle class emerges. India’s middle class includes nearly 300 million people, a number larger than the entire population of the United States. India’s processed food producers and marketers are now facing global competition as a result of economic reforms and market liberalization. The greatest concerns for foreign companies seeking new markets in India is overcoming inadequate and restricted marketing channels. However, significant opportunities can be found through joint ventures and strategic alliances. International marketers see similar growth in middle-income households occurring in the booming East Asian economies like China, Thailand, Singapore, South Korea, and Hong Kong, as well as in Mexico, South America, and sub-Saharan Africa. These new middle-class consumers have both the desire for consumer goods, including luxury and leisure goods and services, and money to pay for them.

Besides generating additional revenue, firms are expanding their operations outside their home country to gain other benefits, including new insights into consumer behavior, alternative distribution strategies, and advance notice of new products. By setting up foreign offices and production facilities, marketers may learn new marketing techniques and gain invaluable experience.
Global marketers are typically well-positioned to compete effectively with foreign competitors. With the fall of Soviet Russia came the rise of a new economy. Although Russia has a well-deserved reputation for being a difficult market to enter, Western companies flocked to the 150 million, product-starved consumers, and many have found the effort worthwhile. A major key to achieving success in foreign markets is a firm’s ability to adapt its products to local preferences. For decades, Bestfoods, makers of Hellmann’s mayonnaise, has marketed different mayonnaise recipes around the world. The special recipe for Russia, for example, is a near-liquid version that is much blander than the U.S. version. Unlike Americans, who spread mayonnaise on bread, Russians pour it over vegetables) Hellman’s has been one of the few foreign companies that has been successful in its marketing efforts to Russia. Its greatest competitive threat comes from state-owned leader Moszhircom mayonnaise.
Another method used by international marketers before entering foreign markets is to conduct transcontinental product testing. Procter & Gamble is a veteran of global marketing but only recently began to develop truly global products. Swiffer, a lightweight mop with disposable cleaning cloths that use static electricity to pick up dust, hair, and other dirt, was test marketed in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and in Sens, France, before its global launch. It was found to be successful in both markets. The name Swiffer is meant to convey speed and ease of use and is used in promotions as both a noun and a verb, as in “Let’s Swiffer the floor.” As one P&G spokesperson explained, “The more that we truly explore consumers on a global basis, the more we find that they’re really more alike than they are dissimilar.” Global testing was also used for P&G’s Dryel home dry-cleaning products. Test sites for Dryel were in Ohio and Ireland.
Since firms must perform the marketing functions of buying, selling, transporting, storing, standardizing and grading, financing, risk taking, and obtaining market information in both domestic and global markets, some may question the wisdom of treating international marketing as a distinct subject. After all, international marketing is marketing; a firm performs the same functions and works toward the same objectives in domestic or international marketing. As the chapter will explain, however, both similarities and differences influence strategies for international and domestic marketing.

As marketing enters the 21st century, a significant change is taking place in the way companies interact with customers. The traditional view of marketing as a simple exchange process—a concept that might be termed transaction-based marketing—is being replaced by a different, longer-term approach.
Traditional marketing strategies focused on attracting customers. The goal was to identi15 prospects, convert them to customers, and complete sales transactions. But today’s marketers realize that, although it remains important, attracting new customers is only an intermediate step in the marketing process. Marketing efforts must focus on establishing and maintaining mutually beneficial relationships with existing customers. These efforts must expand to include suppliers and employees, as well.
This concept, called relationship marketing, refers to the development, growth, and maintenance of long-term, cost-effective exchange relationships with individual customers, suppliers, employees, and other partners for mutual benefit. It broadens the scope of external marketing relationships to include suppliers, customers, and referral sources. In relationship marketing, the term customer takes on a new meaning. Employees serve customers within an organization as well as outside it; individual employees and their departments are customers of and suppliers to one another. They must apply the same high standards of customer satisfaction to intradepartmental relationships as they do to external customer relationships. Relationship marketing recognizes the critical importance of internal marketing to the success of external marketing plans. Programs that improve customer service inside a company also raise productivity and staff morale, resulting in better customer relationships outside the firm.
Relationship marketing gives a company new opportunities to gain a competitive edge by moving customers up a loyalty hierarchy from new customers to regular purchasers, then to loyal supporters of the company and its goods and services, and finally to advocates who not only buy the company’s products but recommend them to others. By converting indifferent customers into loyal ones, companies generate repeat sales. The cost of maintaining existing customers is far below the cost of finding new ones, and these loyal customers are profitable ones.
Programs to encourage customer loyalty are not new. Visa teams up with Holiday Inn resorts and hotels during peak vacation months. Holiday Inn advertisements target families, offering a “kids eat free, stay free” program. In addition, travelers who use their Visa cards to stay at one of over 1,000 participating hotels receive a Kids’ Activity Book with valuable coupons. Visa has a similar program with Best Western; vacationers who use their Visa card to purchase a Summer Adventures Fun Plan also receive a Fujifilm QuickSnap camera with free film processing, a DC Comics activity book, and Internet software from AT&T WorldNet Service. Best Western lodgers can also enter a sweepstakes using their Visa card.
Effective relationship marketing relies heavily on information technologies such as computer databases that record customers’ tastes, price preferences, and lifestyles along with the increase of electronic communications. This technology helps companies become one-to-one marketers that gather customer-specific information and provide individually customized goods and services. The firms target their marketing programs to appropriate groups, rather than relying on mass-marketing campaigns. Companies who study their customers’ preferences and react accordingly gain distinct competitive advantages.
Firms in the service industry, from retailers to hotels to airlines, are among the leaders in relationship marketing. Their staff members have many opportunities to meet customers personally and build loyalty and repeat business. Rewards for frequent buyers of a firm’s goods or services, such as hotel programs that reward frequent visitors with free
room stays and other travel discounts, are another form of relationship
marketing.