It seems like everyone including Moms and Grandmas are on Facebook sharing pictures, status updates and commenting on pages. With all of the updates and changes Facebook is constantly requiring users to update privacy settings….However, if you are not watching this with an Eagle eye, you may be one of the 100 million “FB” users that personal details have been collected and published online, making it hard to impossible to remove this information from the public view.

This data was collected and posted by the Internet site Pirate Bay. Using a code to scan the 500+ million Facebook profiles for any information not hidden by privacy settings. Stated by Ron Bowes of Pirate Bay on his website www.skullsecurity.org the results of this code/search were “spectacular” allowing him to capture 171 million names, 100 million of these being unique.

Facebook is currently downplaying the absorption of this information saying no private data had been compromised. In a statement emailed to msnbc.com, Facebook stated the information on the list was already available online.

Mortgage leads are basically contain mortgage related information that is furnished by the debtor to service providers or to dedicated third party agencies. Some of the actionable information that can be enacted upon by financial service providers includes – name, contact information of prospective debtor, mortgage amount sought out for, his or her current liabilities and other income sources related information. These cues are enough to be acted upon by service providers. They can easily get in touch with the prospective debtor and offer dedicated solutions to meet their financial needs.
How to Generate Mortgage Leads

Mortgage leads can be generated through multi channel framework. Some of the popular means of generating mortgage leads include – online channels, mass media marketing, affiliate marketing and by direct sales or cross sell opportunities. At time, service providers might even consider cold calling options in order to reach out to customers in an effective manner. Dedicated call centers or outsourced contact centers can be utilized to accomplish the task of generating mortgage leads and qualifying them based on the given criteria. Mortgage leads generation is essentially a continuous and evolving activity.

How Many Are Too Many
Financial services providers should ascertain their strengths and weaknesses in order to serve their prospective customer base. Dedicated mortgage lead generation campaign might generate too many leads. However, leads should essentially be qualified based on various parameters such as risk profile, monthly income, asset base, current liabilities and other risk factors. Service providers should only offer services which come under their gamut of offerings. Over committing or under committing might lead to detrimental effects in just about no time at all. Therefore, newer service providers should benchmark their services with the best in business in order to make an impression in mainstream business.
Leaning Possibilities While Generating Mortgage Leads
Financial services providers can get to learn enormously from mortgage lead campaigns on the go. Some of the best learning’s that a service provider can capitalize upon include – most profitable channel for lead generation such as online/Mailer marketing/ Mass media marketing etc. they can also get to understand the pulse of customer in better manner. With the changing trends and lifestyles, mortgage service providers can get to understand what exactly is needed by customers. Tailor made mortgage solutions can power through financial portfolios of one and all in no time. Mortgage lead generation is an art which can be mastered gradually with experience.

As we initially wrote about a couple weeks back, there have been changes to the Arizona immigration law that officially went into effect today 7/29/2010. A judge ruled yesterday, 24 hours prior to the law becoming enforced that portions of the law would be held out including calling for officers to check a person’s immigration status while enforcing other laws and required immigrants to carry identification papers at all times.

Although Arizona’s new law is far more controversial and being watched very closely similar measures have been put in place in other communities such as Fremont – about 30 miles from Omaha in Nebraska. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures during the first half of 2010, lawmakers in all 50 states introduced 1,374 bills and resolutions seeking in some way to restrict or eliminate illegal immigration; 319 of these have been passed in 44 states.

Samples of the recently passed immigration-related measures in 2010 are: ( A full list of these can be viewed here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38386385/ns/us_news-immigration_a_nation_divided/ )

• Arizona: A new law imposes citizenship requirements for tuition loans and teaching degrees.
• Indiana: A new provision of the state code requires proof of legal residence to obtain a driver licenses.
• Iowa: As part of an occupational safety law, the Legislature requires every person, firm or corporation employing migrant laborers to keep on file a work permit for migrant laborers prior to their employment.
• Kansas: A new law makes it illegal to knowingly employ an illegal immigrant.

Michigan, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and South Carolina are all considering full statewide crackdowns modeled on the Arizona law – these laws however are more limited applying restrictions like employment verification and requirements for drivers licenses.

LeadPile is located in Phoenix, the heart of Arizona and will definitely continue to keep an eye on the new laws to keep you up to date!

As we are all now figuring out is that if we visit a website or fill out anything online, a million other people are going to have this information about us. Being in the online lead generation business I know that if you fill out something online you will be someone that most likely will develop a lot of new “friends” that email you. However, visiting certain websites and that being tracked, is something totally different. Should companies be able to track your information online so they can better understand your online behavioral trends? Should this be something that the Federal Trade Commission regulates?
No matter what you think is right or wrong, the FTC is now looking at regulating those that are tracking our online behavioral information. Being in lead generation, we all know that the benefits of lead generation are not the initial requests the consumers are filling out, yet it is the additional remarketing that is the attractive part of capturing the lead information. However, should companies have the right to capture all your internet activity to potentially use to remarket you? Many think the answer is no, therefore this is what is promoting the FTC to look into enacting a new law.
Agree or disagree?

Although there has been some controversy over the new iphone, Apple isn’t going to stop pushing out their products. Apple has new merchandise to offer their users, and many are already excited about the new options.
Starting at $69.00, Apple users will be able to purchase a trackpad that is designed to give the MacBook Pro touchpad experience. Also coming out next month is the new Apple Mac Pros desktop with quad-core and 6-core intel Xeon processors. These desktops will be selling a $2,499. The new iMac is going to be available starting at $1,999. Another product that will be available to consumers from Apple is a 27″ LED cinema display screen for $999 that is compatible with other Apple products. Many businesses such as Leadpile use Apple products and are anxious to continue use of the brand.

Consumer’s fear of sharing personal information is on the rise. Sites selling consumer’s data to irrelevant advertisers who in turn spam or misuse the data often fuel this fear. The TRUSTs seal has become a well-known symbol of verification over the past decade.

Dealix, an auto lead generation site conducted a 90 day test using the seal and saw a 7 percent increase in conversions. Placing the seal at the front end of your funnel helps ensure consumers their data is being protected, especially when a credit card or social security number is required.

TRUSTe requires sites that utilize the seal to have links to their privacy policy and seed TRUSTe to ensure the consumers data is not being mistreated.

It will be interesting to see if the TRUSTe seal is the next trend in the online lead generation space.

Microsoft is stepping up to the plate and creating a market for their new phone, the Microsoft Windows 7 Phone.

Although the last attempt to compete with the iphone failed when creating the KIN phone, senior vice president of mobile Andy Lee says,

“…We’re back with something very different and innovative.”.

The new Microsoft phone will feature a Find My Phone service that offers people a way to look on their computer and trace where their phone is if it becomes lost. It will also have a companion site for storing photos, contacts, etc.

As part of a plan for publicity, they will be distributing the new phone to their 87,000 workers for Microsoft. The new phone is set to launch around October or for the Holiday season. Leadpile

DoubleVerify recently announced it’s new fraud division – Advertising Fraud Detection.  This new division will offer ad verification, security and antivirus experts to research fraud sites that are using malware, spyware, and adware.  This will be useful for companies watching for advertising that is wasting budgeted dollars or any legal concerns.

This new lab will fight malicious activities that can potentially harm brands, legitimate publishers and users, and negatively affect industries overall.

A white paper detailing the findings from the first few months of its inception and recommending actions to minimize publisher fraud and risk will be published this fall.

Facebook seems to be in the news once again for a huge milestone. The news is, Facebook is expected to announce 500 million users. This Facebook news really does not surprise me because everywhere you look every company and every person seems to have a Facebook profile. So what does this kind of thing really mean to any of us? I guess it means that if you are one of the rare people that has not joined the Facebook craze, you are one of the very few lonely souls in the world to not jump on the band wagon.
The impact Facebook is having on all of our “worlds” is truly amazing and I believe it will be setting an example for the future of the internet and dealing with privacy issues. Stay tuned to see if Facebook reaches 1 billion users!

Visit the Leadpile Facebook page

Creativity is an important attribute to our daily activities, especially in this fast paced industry, where new ideas will help you and your team to get a competitive edge.

Few things to remember when it comes to creativity: Negative emotions block creative thinking; Relax more – it will help you get some great ideas; Don’t be too worried – it will make your day worse; Stay positive and project positivity to your team.

For the first time, electronic books for Amazon’s Kindle has outnumbers sales for hardcover books consecutively for the past 3 months. The Kindle which has been on the market for 33 months has been selling an average of 143 ebooks for every 100 hardcover books. This number recently jumped to 180 ebooks for every 100 hardcover books sold on Amazon.com.

Consumers who do not own a Kindle can enjoy Kindle books on many other devices such as laptops, ipohnes, ipads, Blackberries and Android phones.

This study does not include paperback book sales but it’s amazing how technology plays such a large role in such a simple pleasure.

Marketing comes in many different forms, one of the catchiest are the “stick in your head” jingles. According to Forbes.com these are the best advertising jingles as voted on by a group of CMO’s and advertising executives. To have a successful jingle, the consumer must listen to it, and not only like it – but want to sing it! Once people starting singing the jingle, they all essentially become advertisers for that brand. Were you ever caught singing any of these?

• I’d like to buy the world a Coke ( Coca Cola )
• Oh, I wish I were an Oscar Mayer Wiener (Oscar Mayer)
• Two all beef patties (McDonalds)
• I don’t wanna grow up, I’m a Toys R Us kid (Toys ‘R Us)
• You Deserve a Break Today (McDonald’s)
• Wouldn’t you like to be a pepper too? (Dr. Pepper)
• Campbell’s Soup M’m M’m Good ( Campbell’s Soup)
• Plop, plop, fizz, fizz oh what a relief it is…(Alka Seltzer)
• Stuck on Me (Band-Aid)
• Double Your Pleasure, Double Your Fun (Wrigley’s Doublemint Gum)