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Buying a beach house in New Zealand offers many possibilities.

New Zealand is made up of two main islands, North Island and South Island, giving it miles of coastal lands and perfect beaches to live by. Each island offers its own unique climate conditions and way of life.

Make Money from the Real Estate investment

One aspect to consider when you think about buying a beach house in New Zealand is the possibility of earning money from it. There are several ways to do this. You could rent or lease your house to tourists. You could also live in it with an eye toward selling it for more than you paid for it in the not to distant future. The New Zealand real estate market is rapidly growing, and giving someone else a chance to buy a New Zealand beach house could earn you a lot of money.

Rules for Investment

If you are interested in buying a beach house in New Zealand as an investment property, visit www.landlords.co.nz. It will be important for you to know about taxes, mortgages in New Zealand, and learn if you have to be a New Zealand resident to be a New Zealand landlord, and find answers to the many other questions you’ll most likely have.

Coromandel

One popular area on North Island is the Coromandel Coast on the Coromandel Peninsula. The nearest town is stunning Cook’s Beach. It would be a spectacular place to buy your dream New Zealand beach house. For dramatic pictures and a full description, visit
prosale.co.nz.

Waiwera

If you prefer to buy a beach house in New Zealand close to a metropolitan area, think about Waiwera which is less than a thirty minute drive to Auckland. You would be unable to buy a piece of land where you could build a new home. The area is closed to more growth. However if you want to buy an existing beach house in New Zealand and live in a truly wondrous setting, this might be your perfect spot. You’ll live near thermal pools, a nature reserve, and be able to launch your boat right from the beach.

Virtual Tour

Whatever your reason for buying a beach house in New Zealand, you need to check out the many potential areas. It would be lovely to take a tour in person to see all the marvelous beaches where you might purchase your house or property. However, one of the great things about our high-tech society is that you can take virtual tours and see marvelous pictures of a number of unbelievably beautiful properties. Within minutes of going out on the Internet, you’ll be amazed you didn’t think of buying a beach house in New Zealand, long before now.

For more on Real Estate opportunities in New Zealand visit http://nzpassport.com/artman/publish/cat_index_48.shtml

Copyright 2005 Ofer Shoshani

Ofer Shoshani has been working for the last 5 years as a professional journalist, writing about finance, economy, travel and lifestyle. During these years he lived and wrote from Spain, Colombia, Venezuela, Peru, Ecuador, USA, Israel, India & Thailand. More of his work can be found at http://www.nzpassport.com (Immigration and Relocation to New Zealand), http://www.bespanish.com (Immigration and Relocation to Spain) and http://www.betotal.com (Intl. Charity organizations, Child Sponsorship programs, Donation, World Aid, Aids in Africa and Poverty).

The internet is all about finding out information on a particular subject. There are many different types of website, some offer a service, some offer a product and some merely offer advice. In this article I write about this third type of site which I refer to as information portals.

I am not sure if you have ever heard of a program that the search engine Google run, which is called Google adsense. Basically people pay to appear on the front pages of results under certain keywords such as web hosting. Their advert then appears under the sponsored listing sections of the search results which can be above or to the right of the natural listings. This advertising program is called Google adwords and has proved to be very popular with advertisers who are attempting to attract more traffic to their site. This is also known as pay per click (ppc) and many of the other major search engines also run similar programs.

Google adsense is a bit different. This is where people who own a website allow Google to include these Google adword adverts on their site. When people who visit the site click on one of the ads, the website owner receives a percentage of the income received. This is paid to the website owner normally on a monthly basis by Google.

One of the problems with this program is that it is taking your visitors away from your site. You may be making some money but these people of course may have bought your product or taken up your service if they had spent longer at and reading your website.

This is where sites which are purely information based and do not offer a service or product can do well with Google adsense. The website owners of these information portals are quite happy for you to click on one of the Google adverts as they do not care if you move onto reading another site.

These information portals are becoming more and more popular with people who are trying to increase their monthly earnings on adsense. People who design this type of site should normally be able to offer their services for a very affordable fee. Typically you should not need to break the bank and I personally know of somebody who only charges £150 plus free hosting for a fifteen page information portal site.

The web designer is able to find the content for these information portals in the many article directories which are now out there.

Indeed someone maybe following you; hello I see you have searched on an Internet Search Engine; “I Think Someone is Following Me!” and perhaps they are. Yet most likely no one is following you. Many people who come up with conspiracy theories suffer as functioning borderline Schizophrenics, don’t worry it may not be so bad. It appears that there are quite a few folks like that out there. And if you are one of them, you may find this information quite interesting; Schizophrenics are said to be of very high intelligence.

If you read conspiracy theories on the Internet many of the things you read come from people who like you believe that they are being followed by someone and when you read these comments online, many are very scientific sounding indeed. Very believable and convincing so you say maybe there is something to this? Maybe, but here is the dig. The smartest folks who believe they are being followed maybe the wrong ones to listen too. Because it is well known that those who are Schizophrenics are of such high IQ that simply by nature would sound very scientific.

If someone really was being followed or used by a secret spy agency or group then most likely they would be dummies. This is because they could be more easily controlled or manipulated and thus would be better sleeper cells or candidate targets to manipulate. For instance only a complete blundering idiot would strap a bomb to themselves expecting to get to heaven and receive 72-Virgins? Apparently these people are not too bright, as they always fail to ask the question what happens after the first 72 days are over?

Now then, all of this is not to say that; “Just because you maybe paranoid does not mean someone is not after you” as the saying goes. Only you can determine that. What I am saying is if you are using the Internet to confirm that “You Think Someone is Following You” then chances are someone out there who is delusional will have a website with information confirming your suspicions and if you think some is not following you, then someone else will have proof of that too. So think on this for me as you try to figure out who is really following you. Good luck on this in 2006.

“Lance Winslow” - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; http://www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

Building Consensus in a Family Business
Family Business Expert suggests…
First, build a strategic plan for the family

By Don A. Schwerzler

One of the most difficult problems confronting family businesses is building a consensus about how the business should be operated, now and into the future.
In a non family business, the answer is rather simple and obvious: Develop and implement a strategic plan.

In a family business, the process is dramatically more complicated and filled with situations that can devastate both the family and the business.

A Strategic Plan for the Family
Many family business owners do not understand that before a family business can develop a successful strategic plan for the business, there must first be a strategic plan for the family.
For example, ensuring the senior generation’s financial security, independent of the business, generally is a fundamental requirement of the family’s strategic plan. Meeting this goal then becomes a critical objective for the strategic plan of the business.

In other words, the economic engine (the business) is being asked to reach a specific financial goal of the family, as opposed to reaching a business objective such as ROI, or other ratios or measures of profitability.

First Step Toward Consensus
One of the first steps in developing a successful process for building consensus is to clearly understand the different perspectives “between” generations (inter-generational issues) and “among” generations (intra-generational issues).
Inter-generational issues are generally easier to determine, and they are usually related to life stages. For example:

Parent Offspring
Conservative Aggressive
Risk adverse Risk taking
Security conscious Development conscious
Strategy: status quo Strategy: change/growth
Controlling Wanting control
Managing the Past Managing the Future

Intra-generational issues
Intra-generational issues are less likely to be identified and discussed. As a result, these issues tend to “fester” over long periods of time, and they frequently present themselves in an explosive and destructive manner.
Some of these Intra-generational issues include differences in compensation, perks, status, individual personal values and public recognition factors (visibility). Other problem areas are educational differences, varying levels of personal and professional sophistication, differing opinions of “value
contribution,” and, most importantly, spouse issues.

The Role of Facilitators
Because many of the inter- generational and intra-generational issues can be “confrontational,” it is generally a wise investment to retain a “facilitator” trained and experienced in dealing with family business dynamics.
This facilitator can assist the family in organizing and prioritizing real or perceived differences among various family members. In fact, dealing with these issues can actually become the “agenda” for family retreats.

Objective Understanding of the Business
Concurrent to recognizing the inter- and intra-generational family issues, to develop consensus in an FOB, it is equally essential to gain an objective understanding of the business. From an Operations Management perspective the most difficult problem is clearly identifying the crucial operational characteristics of the business. To be successful, this process should be independently constructed and must be based on operational information, not financial information.

The Importance of Objective Measurement
Unfortunately, in most family businesses the operational characteristics of the business are never accurately or objectively described. Key decisions are based not on hard facts but on various “interpretations” of sometimes unrelated circumstances. This is not an unusual phenomenon: Family businesses tend to rely on well-intentioned people, memory, and varying degrees of managerial expertise to reach their business goals and objectives, rather than creating a sound operating system.
As an illustration, I often ask family business CEOs to question their senior managers about how much work is accomplished daily in their individual areas of responsibility. If these key managers merely are able to report results, without knowing and measuring the labor hours involved, a serious managerial discrepancy exists.

Designing a process for correcting this problem generally can be accomplished within a few days, depending on the complexity of the operation. Validating the operational characteristics of the business should be a high priority issue, one that commands immediate attention.

A Three-Legged Stool
Building consensus in a family business can be compared to the proverbial three-legged stool. There is the Senior Generation, the Succeeding Generation, and the Business. Each “leg” has different needs and issues, and each requires different kinds of expertise to ensure that those needs are met and the issues resolved.
Unless equal importance and attention is given to each group in a family business, optimum stability will never be realized. Unfortunately for many family businesses, building a harmonious consensus will always remain a dream and never become a reality.

Web masters and E-zine Publishers:
Free professional content - pre licensed to you…
You are invited to use any or all of these articles in your publication or web site. The only requirement is the inclusion of the following, after each article…
Don is a family business expert. His web site located at http://www.family-business-experts.com reveals ideas, tips and strategies that promote understanding family values and business systems. Make sure you stop by and pick up their free newsletter or subscribe at http://www.family-business-experts.com/understanding-family-business.html

What are you going to do tomorrow? It’s a funny thing, but nearly everybody, even people who haven’t a clue what they’ll do on any other day, seems to know what they’re going to do tomorrow.



The reason of course, is that tomorrow is when you’ll do all the things you haven’t got round to today…yesterday…for the last few weeks, months, years!



Many people, it turns out, confess to losing money, opportunity, failing exams or even losing jobs just because of not getting around to things.



Things you’re putting off nag at you, stress you, distract you. You feel guilty and weak. It’s hard to relax and enjoy yourself with them hanging over you. You may even feel that you can’t embark on any project till the stuff you’ve been putting off is done. So a few tedious letters and a couple of overdue phone calls can acquire horrific proportions and become a logjam which puts half your life on hold.



Getting going starts with looking beyond your excuses. You’re too busy, it’s not a good time, it doesn’t really matter, you’ll do it after this and that has happened … You can’t deal with the issue till you face the fact that you are actually putting something off.



Then, ask why this task or project is stuck. What will happen if you don’t do it, and does that really matter? Maybe it’s something someone else thinks you should do when your own instincts are against it. Perhaps you’re rebelling against someone else’s agenda?


But maybe you’re putting something off because it will start a process of change. Change is scary. But looking the consequences full in the face takes a lot of the fear out of it. Studies of successful change show that moving from meaning to do something, to doing it, is the most difficult step of all. If you don’t make it, you are going nowhere. But you can hesitate a long, long time first.



Whatever you’ve been putting off, here are some tried-and-tested tips for getting around to it. Good luck!



* Face up to change. Change is scary. But vividly imagine the gains you’ll make from getting that put-off stuff out of your life — and your head. Imagine the benefits of a clear desk, done paperwork, a clean house, application forms sent off, projects handed in, phone calls made …


* Face up to the costs! Make a clear picture of the results if you DON’T do something. Keep reminding yourselves of all the negative things which will happen if you don’t do it, and all the positive things which can’t happen.



* Break up big tasks so that every day, in however small a way, you get nearer your goal. So if the idea of getting fit is too overwhelming, plan it out by scheduling today for finding the phone number of a health club, tomorrow for asking a friend if she’d like to go with you, and so on.



* First things first! Make this your daily motto. Stick it up all over the place to stop yourself getting sidetracked and make sure you do what matters TODAY, not tomorrow.



* Bin the mouldy oldies. Head cluttered with trivial half-done projects you were never that keen on anyway? Bin them or do them, but get them out of your life.



* Set a time limit you can definitely keep to. Don’t try and do something in one fell swoop but allocate half an hour a day for doing a bit of it. Or twenty minutes. Even fifteen. At the end of that time, STOP– even if you want to go on. But get into the routine of spending that 20 minutes a day EVERY DAY.



* Or try the five minute technique. Tell yourself, you’ll just spend five minutes doing whatever. At the end of that time, decide whether you’ll spend another five minutes. And so. This way, you don’t have to make a big commitment.



* If you can’t face a project as a whole, then pick around the edges of it. A bit of this today, a bit of that tomorrow. You’ll soon find you’ve picked at so many bits that you’ve dealt with the worst of it …



* Are you putting something off because there’s just one really difficult bit? Do it first. Can’t make yourself do that? OK, then decide to tackle it last, using the energy and strength you’ll get from having got everything else out of the way.



* And finally, take something you’ve been putting off. Isolate one task that’s part of it.

And do it now!

Jane Firbank’s site, http://www.secretsofchange.com/, has over 100 fascinating and helpful problem letter replies, plus scores of articles and book reviews.

Jane Firbank is a psychotherapist working from the new Human Givens approach to counselling. This unites cutting-edge psychological and brain research with the new insights of evolutionary psychology and the ancient insights of the traditional healing and spiritual disciplines. The Human Givens approach is powerfully and rapidly effective in helping people move on from depression, stress and anxiety, obsession, psychosis, relationship problems and addiction. Phobias, traumas and Post Traumatic Stress can often be removed in one or two sessions using the latest knowledge of how the brain works.

Jane Firbank, BSc (Psych), HG Dip, GHR, is in private practice in London, England where she also regularly writes and consults on psychological matters for the Press, TV and radio.

People in UK hesitate to apply for loans as they believe that there past bad credit record would come in the way of approval of their loan. Bad credit loans UK can be the right resource of funds you are looking for.

Everybody have dreams, desires for various things like home, cars, traveling around the world, or even to give there child a better education. All these dreams and desires require large financial investment which may not be possible for every person to afford.

The tag of bad credit is attached to you when you make defaults in payments of your debts in the past. It may include late-payments, non-payments, arrears, bankruptcy, your unpaid credit card bills etc. so to get rid of bad credit you can take the help of credit counseling agencies. They will suggest you the ways to improve your credit score. They will also help you out in the applying for a bad credit loan UK.

It is said that the number of lenders who offer loans to people with bad credit is very less. This is not the truth as there are still lenders willing to offer there money to people with bad credit. You just have to present your property or any valuable asset as collateral to the lenders. And you can get the approval for a secured bad credit loan.

However if you don’t have any collateral to offer, you can still apply for an unsecured bad credit loan. This loan carries a slightly higher level of interest as the risk for the lender is more. But an unsecured bad credit loan gives you the freedom from the constant worry about loosing your property.

If you are a UK resident, for getting the best deal in a bad credit loan you can search for various websites offering you free quotes regarding the amount of loan, term for repayment and terms and conditions of the loan package they are offering. This saves you from going to offices of different lenders as everything can be done through click of a mouse.

Remember, a bad credit situation can happen to anyone. One way to obtain a loan with poor credit is bad credit loan UK. Bad credit Loans UK can be considered as the financial support you look for fulfillment of your dreams.

Peter Taylor is a senior financial analyst at Bad Credit Loans with an acumen for finance and insurance. His articles are widely read because of the lucid manner of writing and thoroughly researched datas. To find Bad credit personal loans, Bad credit payday loans, Bad credit loans UK that best suit your need visit http://www.badcreditloans.uk.com

Extent of pregnancy prejudice in Britain’s workplaces

Each year around 30,000 working women are sacked, made redundant or leave their jobs due to pregnancy discrimination, according to alarming new research findings released recently by the Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC).

The research quantifies, for the first time, how many pregnant women and new mothers say they are experiencing discrimination in workplaces across the country.

Of the 441,000 pregnant women that are at work each year, the EOC’s research report reveals that:

• Overall almost half (45%) of women who had worked while pregnant said they experienced some form of discrimination because of their pregnancy.

• A fifth (21%) said they lost out financially due to discrimination.

• One in 20 (5%) were put under pressure to hand in their notice when they announced their pregnancy.

The results were released as the EOC launched its ‘Pregnant and Productive’ campaign calling for urgent action to end unlawful treatment of pregnant women at work.

The EOC’s campaign emphasises that the majority of employers are supportive of women during their pregnancy, and many are well aware of the business benefits of doing so. The EOC is working with employers and employees to find solutions to the problem.

Employees can also help themselves by being aware of their legal rights, says Julia Beasley, a solicitor specialising in Employment Law at Bristol law firm Burroughs Day.

For instance, during Ordinary Maternity Leave (OML), which lasts 26 weeks, a woman is entitled to the same terms and conditions (excluding pay) as if she had not been absent.

“This means that if she returns to work after OML, she is entitled to her job back - with any pay increases, seniority, pension and similar rights as if she had not been absent. And her period of OML must be treated as part of her continuous service when it comes to service-related benefits. “

“If the employer refuses to allow her to return to her old job following maternity leave, this is a dismissal. Depending on the circumstances, she may have a claim of unfair dismissal and sex discrimination.”

“An employee who encounters problems should, in most cases, raise a detailed written grievance with her employer. If the problem is not sorted, she may be able to bring a claim in the Employment Tribunal. But the very first stage should be to take legal advice,” adds Ms Beasley.

“If the employer refuses to allow her to return to her old job following maternity leave, this is a dismissal. Depending on the circumstances, she may have a claim of unfair dismissal and sex discrimination.”

“An employee who encounters problems should, in most cases, raise a detailed written grievance with her employer. If the problem is not sorted, she may be able to bring a claim in the Employment Tribunal. But the very first stage should be to take legal advice,” adds Ms Beasley.

Arabella Greatorex is the owner of http://www.naturalnursery.co.uk, an online store selling organic and fairly traded products for families including organic clothing and nappies, fairly traded toys and natural toiletries.

Now a days managing files and folders on PCs seems to be a critical task for network administrators and data storage managers due to huge capacity hard disks and millions of files and folders.

This article will help you in two ways

1. Understand the disk space allocation and wastage.

2. Understand how to manage your disk space.

Topics covered

• 1. What is File Allocation Table (FAT) ?
• 2. Disk Efficiency and FAT.
• 3. What is Wasted Space. ?
• 4. Solution.

What is File Allocation Table

The FAT is a roadmap, or index, that points to the location where all the information in files is stored on a floppy disk or hard drive. The FAT is extremely important because the system uses it to store and retrieve files containing information.

When you save a file in Windows, it is stored in multiple pieces (in clusters made up of multiple sectors) on the disk. Windows also saves the roadmap, or index, that points to these clusters in two copies of the FAT (File Allocation Table). The FAT contains the directions to all the pieces of your files, so that applications can find them again later

Disk Efficiency and FAT.

Every file on your system is stored in clusters in your hard drive, the maximum of one file can be stored in a particular cluster, so this results in wastage if the file is under the cluster size. The current FAT version (FAT16) organises files in 32K clusters in drives over 1.2gig, while FAT32 will use a minimum cluster size of 4K. This means that a 3K file wastes only 1K of disk space on FAT32, while it wastes 29K of space on a standard FAT system. This wastage can result in over 50% of a 2gig drive being wasted. See the table below.

What’s a cluster and why does cluster size matter?

The whole problem of wasted space arises from the fact that DOS allocates file space in “clusters”. Clusters are sequentially numbered on the disk, starting at 0, and cluster numbers are used both in the FAT (file allocation table) and in the individual directory entry for each file.

Allocation by clusters means some space on the disk will be wasted. Regardless of the actual length of a file as reported by the DIR command, the file will actually occupy a whole number of clusters on the disk. So a 1-byte file will actually use a whole cluster, a file that’s 1 cluster plus 1 byte long will use 2 clusters, and so on.

Is this serious? It can be, depending on the pattern of file sizes on your disk. For instance, if you have an 2GB disk with 5,000 files on it, about 100 MB of your disk is being wasted. And the figures can be much worse, depending on the pattern of your usage. One user reported copying 450 MB of files to a 1.6 GB disk and having them take up 600 MB! As your disk approaches being full, you may wish you could squeeze some extra space out of it instead of buying a new disk.

How does cluster size depends on hard-disk size?

As mentioned above in the table the cluster size for various partition sizes so that you can make intelligent choices about how to partition your hard disk.

From the above table we see that even 2.1 GB drive is over the 1023 kilo-byte limit for 16 KB clusters and therefore its cluster size (unpartitioned) is 32 KB. With a 32 KB cluster, even a 1-byte file will use 32 KB of disk space. A file whose length is 32,769 to 65,536 bytes will likewise use two clusters (64 KB), and so on for higher file sizes.

Even so, you may be inclined to think this is no big deal. But think about it: if you have a 2.1 GB drive with 5,000 files, you’re probably wasting about 160 MB.

How are cluster sizes determined?

Clusters are always some power of 2 times 512 bytes, but just which power of 2 depends on the disk size. Why should this be so? I mentioned above that clusters are numbered sequentially. The problem is that the directory structure and the FAT have room for only 16 bits for a cluster number. Since the largest unsigned number that will fit into a 16-bit field is 2^16-1 = 65535, the disk can hold at most 2^16 = 65536 clusters. This gives the formula

disk size

cluster size = ———, rounded up to a power of 2

65536

In general the wasted space per file will be half a cluster.

—–

What is Wasted Space?

Whenever a file is created, space will be allocated to the file in the form of clusters. A cluster can be of 8 KB , 16 KB or 32 KB depending upon your hard disk partition size. Following is the chart for cluster size.

FAT FAT32

Partition Size Cluster Size Partition Size Cluster Size

128 - 256 MB

4 KB

1 - 8 GB

4 KB

257 - 512 MB

8 KB

8 - 16 GB

8 KB

513 - 1024 MB

16 KB

16 - 32 GB

16 KB

1025 - 2048 MB

32 KB

>32 GB

32 KB

So the formula for wasted space is Wasted Space = Allocated Space - Actual File Size.

We will take an example of file which is of 900 bytes in size and your partition type is - FAT and its size is 1024 MB. So the allocated space for your file will be 16384 bytes or 16 KB whether you store 900 bytes or 1 byte in the file. So the wasted space in this case will be

Wasted Space = 16384 - 900 = 15484 bytes.

So the conclusion is : Lesser the file size, more the wasted space.

Solution

So to analyze how our disk space is being wasted we need a smart program which will show us the space hogging files and their locations.

We are working with File system softwares since last 2 years. We have developed a powerful disk space analysis and cleaning software - DiskAnalyzer Professional 1.5 which allows you to take control of your disk space and reclaim gigabytes of lost disk space.

You can visit our website to get more information about the software http://www.craveworldwide.com

Manoj Shinde

Crave Worldwide, India.

Child Safety Restraints and children in work vehicles

If you take your child in your work car, van, SUV or work truck, you should determine the type of safety seat that’s appropriate to your child’s age or weight and will allow you full control of the vehicle including use of the stick shift.

If your child is newborn to nine months or twenty pounds, use an infant safety seat. With this type of protection, the infant rides backwards in a semi-reclining position and is held in place by a built-in harness. The vehicle’s lap belt secures the safety seat in place. For comfort and added support, folded towels may be placed between the infant’s body and sides of the seat.

If your child is nine months to four years or forty pounds, use a toddler safety seat. There are two types of restraints: the harness and the booster seat. The harness in a wrap around seat comes across both shoulders and up between the legs. The padded sides offer protection. The seat is secured by the vehicle’s safety belt. Some models are anchored at the top with a bolt. If you use this type, you must install the anchor bolt on the rear shelf or the seat will be unsafe. In the elevated booster seat, the child is secured by the vehicle lap belt and either the vehicle shoulder belt or the special harness sold with the unit, which required an anchor bolt.

If your child is over four years, we recommend that you use the safety belt in the company car, van, SUV or work truck. Remember, your family is your first priority.

Do not let kids ride in the back of a work truck. If you should take your company van or truck to little league, AYSO, Girl Scouts, cheerleading, band tournaments, etc. for advertising that is a smart thing to do indeed and yes this is good for business. People see the company van or truck with logos, make sure when others see your portable advertisement they see it being used properly with the safety of the children also in mind. If you go to pizza afterwards, only take as many kids as available seat belts. Please stay safe and protect your business from liability lawsuits and above all let’s keep the kids safe too, someday they will be working for you or maybe running your business in your retirement, think about it please.

“Lance Winslow” - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

The letter…Ah, yes. It’s a very splendid thing - when done correctly. But when was
the last time you read a letter than really ‘talked’ to you, that pulled you in, that did
its job?

Whether used as sales devices in their own right, to entice lost customers back into
the fold, appeal to prospective customers, act as reminders for an unpaid invoice,
undo the damage caused by bad publicity…letters are the oil that run the business
engine. And every business worth its salt uses sales letters - aka direct response or
marketing letters - to appeal to and stimulate a response from customers and
prospects. They’re like your personal sales-force in print.

Write a good sales letter, and you can win customer loyalty and even make a small
fortune. For example, manager of specialist recruitment firm Jessica won three new
jobs from three new clients within days of sending out her sales letter campaign.

However, if your sales letters are guilty of any of the following, beware: you could
lose out on sales and even lost custom. That’s what happened to sole trader George.
He spent his entire marketing budget on a sales letter that was sent to 3,000
prospects. It sank: only two enquiries and no sales.

Time to reveal what he and many others got wrong, then…

Mistake # 1: And you are?
Most people fall at the first hurdle, before any pen has been put to paper. They buy
a few mailing lists, get out one of their generic letters (”Hey! It wasn’t too bad last
time, right?”) and, zap, off it goes to the individuals on that list.

But who exactly is behind that list? What are their fears, wants, hopes, desires..?
How old are they? Male or female? What is the common denominator of the people
on the list? How can you start to even thing of appealing to their emotions if they
have such wide and varying characteristics? Approximately 90% of all businesses
don’t bother to find answers.

Before you are able to adequately address the specific concerns of your market, you
should pinpoint exactly whom you are hoping to reach. Your list is your market, so
get to know it inside out.

Mistake # 2: Enter the list
What if the list you have is not an ideal match for your product or service? Perhaps
the most obvious yet common blunders with letter mailings is selecting a wrong or
outdated list.

It’s worth bearing in mind that your campaign will only be as good as the mailing
list used. And there’s absolutely no point in trying to send a beautifully crafted sales
letter to the wrong people. You don’t have to be a genius to realise that a letter
explaining the benefits of pensions will not be a hit with a group of teenagers.

So what makes for the best list? Your own list. Most businesses overlook this
biggest source of never-ending profits. Start by collecting emails and other details
of visitors to your website, telephone enquirers, and so on.

Mistake # 3: Heads up!
Around 99% of all businesses sending out sales letters omit one crucial element: the
headline. Why is it so important? Because it will be the first thing your reader will
look at. If there’s nothing immediate there to stir his or her interest, your letter will
more than likely be ignored.

A good headline demands attention and compels the reader to read the rest of your
letter.

Mistake # 4: Ego trip
Believe it or not your prospect doesn’t want to know about you and how great you
reckon your company/product/service is. They want to know what’s in it for them -
why should they keep reading?

How do you know if there isn’t enough focus on the prospect? Grab one of your
latest sales letters. How many times do you use the words Our, We, Us or your
business/brand name? Now count the number of times you use the words You,
Yours, Your.

Which scores higher? If it’s the former, you’ve committed one of the deadliest yet so
simple sins in the direct response world. Change it so that You, Yours and Your
make more of an appearance, and you should see a difference in response rates.

Mistake # 5: Benefit of the doubt
One of the oldest and most widely acknowledged ‘rule’ for writing letters that sell is,
“Stress the benefits, not the features.” Aside from technical products, where features
are used to differentiate between products, benefits are what make things
irresistible.

Far too many businesses stress the features of their product and don’t even mention
the benefits. Big mistake. Readers want to know how they will personally benefit
from buying your product. What are they getting for the price you’re charging? Be
sure to focus on your customer and present her with benefits that fit in with her
wants and needs.

Mistake # 6: No offers
I get asked by clients why their letter isn’t pulling the desired response. One of the
mistakes I see time and time again is that there is no incentive for the reader to
respond. To be successful, your letter should include an appealing offer that would
make it almost impossible for readers NOT to respond. You want them to act now,
don’t you?!

Mistake # 7: Out of action
Even if you do offer an incentive to respond, have you clearly explained what they
potential customer should do next? Quite a number of letters go out without a ‘call
of action’, so the reader never responds. Think about it, if they get to the point
where they think, “Mmm, this looks interesting…” do you think they will go to the
bother of hunting down how to place an order? Not many do, if any.

Mistake # 8: The proof of the pudding…
I never cease to be amazed by how many people don’t bother to offer proof that
their company is the one to do business with. Even if you have done a good job so
far and managed to show how and why your product is the best one in the universe,
today’s highly skeptical marketplace means that you absolutely have to provide
proof and come across as credible.

Mistake # 9: Risky business
Say you’re targeting a couple of thousand prospective customers and you omitted to
mention your guarantee (you DO have one, don’t you?), the likelihood is that they
will hesitate to do business with you. The risk might be too great. People need to be
reassured that there will be no strings attached to purchasing your product, so give
them reason to buy with confidence. Offer a guarantee or some other form of risk-
reversal. Research shows that few people actually take up guarantees if the product
or service is good enough.

Mistake # 10: Mind your language
One of the quickest ways to kill any response from your letter is to use weak,
unimaginative and unconvincing language. A lot of letters posted through today’s
letterboxes are full of vague phraseology. They lack specifics, authority, creativity
and, worse of all, there’s no ‘persuasive’ copy. Using the right words and solid facts
can dramatically increase your letter’s success rate.

Tracey “Word Doctor” Dooley of MediaMinister (http://www.mediaminister.co.uk) is an
experienced copywriter, editor and marketer. She has spent almost 14 years crafting
compelling copy that successfully sells, informs, educates or entertains.
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This article is the copyrighted property of Tracey Dooley, © 2005. All rights
reserved. Reprint permission is granted as long as the article is printed in its
entirety, including the resource box, with this notice intact, and providing no
changes are made. Please let me know (via http://www.mediaminister.co.uk) of any usage,
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