As the end of December comes around and the beginning of January nears, people in general start re-evaluating their budget.  A popular new years resolution is “saving money”.  So if this is a common goal why is it so hard to accomplish?

Due to the economic recession many households are making less then before, making it hard to bank extra money.  We also live in a society that thrives on promoting or advertising what you must have!  The line between need and want often become crossed and we end up overspending for the month.

So how can we save?  The answer lies in each one of us.   We don’t have to strive for the moon – to overshoot and miss all together.  If we take baby steps we can be successful, and if one month you fall down, don’t let it stop you!  Get up and start over again.  Here are a few money saving tips that can help you get started:

1. Set up a separate savings account and actually use it to save money.
2. Split your direct deposit so that $25.00 out of each paycheck goes into your savings account.  (out of sight out of mind)
3. Save any change that you receive after making a cash purchase. (you will be surprised how fast this adds up)
4. Plan a monthly budget, start with you needs first i.e. Rent/mortgage, electricity, car payments etc. and then budget in an allotted dollar amount for wants and stick to it.
5. Write out your grocery list before you go shopping and only get what is on the list

If you start implementing even a couple of these suggestion you will be surprised by what you can save!

Happy Savings!

I’m not much of a frequent air traveler however, when I do travel – I don’t want to spend an extra $240 for bag fees on a roundtrip ticket.  Let me put it this way, I booked a ticket with a reputable, “I hope we won’t crash” airline to fly from Phoenix to Fort Lauderdale 3 months ago.   I’ll tell you, I walked up to the counter to check in with my fiancé, handed out tickets to ticket agent, she started typing away and processing our tickets.  We’re so excited to get on the plane and jet to paradise (no, not Fort Lauderdale… The Bahamas) to check out our where we’re getting married in February and meet out wedding planner and all the fun stuff that comes along with that.

Back to the counter, the agent asked “will you be checking any bags today?”  Yes, we have 4 bags…  She then got a huge smile on her face, rubbed hands together and said,  “How would you like to pay for your bag fees, credit card or…?  (I swear she stared drooling out of the side of her mouth like she just got back from the dentist getting a cavity filled)  I cut her off and said, “what bag fees”?  Sir, to check your bags on this flight its $120, how would you like to pay for that?

I had a heart attack fell on the floor, starting convulsing… After I recovered from said heart attack, I calmed myself down, talked it out with my fiancé a bit, sucked it up and put the $120 on my credit card.

Now, we’re on the plane, I’ve started drinking already, granted it was only 10AM, but I needed something to help with the pain..

Our trip was great, had a fabulous time on the beach, relaxing for 6 days, enjoying the sunshine and each others company..

…Now the trip is over. Not yet ready to get back to reality, but will be nice to be home however.

We’re all set, packed up, called a cab to get us from the hotel..  Got to the airport, walked up to the ticket counter gave the very nice lady our tickets, she asked us, “Will you be checking any bags with us today?”  Yes, we will be checking 4 bags today.

The next words out of her mouth were the most unexpected words I would hear,  “That will be $120 or your bag fees, how would you like to pay for those today?”

Holy $*@#$% I feel another heart attack coming on…  I said to the lady behind the counter, I already paid for those in Phoenix. No Sir, I’m sorry, you only paid your bag fees for one way.  WHAT!!!!!  Are you kidding me??  I have to pay another $120 for bag fees??

Yes, that’s correct sir, how would you like to pay for that today?

At this point, I’m so frustrated I stared laughing in fear that I was going to do something stupid at the airport and end up in jail.

I gave her my credit card, ONCE AGAIN!!!  She ran the card and said, “thank you sir, I hope you have a wonderful flight”.  YEAH, WHATEVER LADY!!!

So after all of this, we were sitting on the plane, I said to my fiancé you know what, “we just paid $900 for roundtrip tickets that should have only cost us $650.

Again, I started drinking again, to ease the pain…

I have two words for every airline out there that charges bag fees… CON ARTIST!!

You may have to take out a PayDay Loan to pay your bag fees….

If you have a choice in choosing an airline that flies to your destination, I would recommend Southwest Airlines for your travels…

I hope you enjoyed this story. I still haven’t recovered from this completely. If anyone has recommendations on how to get through this, feel free to respond.

Safe travels everyone…

According to mobiThinking, In 2009 there were over 5.3 billion mobile subscribers and over half a billion had a smartphone. In 2011, 85% of those mobile subscribers will have web-enabled smartphones. That’s a huge spike in web-enabled mobile users. Although many companies have adopted some of the latest trends of smartphones, there are 3 things that they have not fully capitalized to their full potential. These 3 areas of opportunity can easily help your business adopt to the fast-paced mobile world and improve your customer’s experience:

NFC capabilities: Get enrolled now!

Most of all retailers and small business have a merchant Point of Sale machine that handle debit and credit card transactions, and now is the time for those machines to get upgraded to handle the onslaught of NFC enabled mobile phones that will be soon shipping within the next 2 years. Be ahead of the curve and get signed up or upgrade soon. This will not only give you a competitive advantage over other retailers but it will keep customer satisfaction high, as many consumers will be eager to try this new form of payment.

Get Proactively Involved with E-Coupons and Rewards.

Many consumers are shifting their shopping from actual stores to online retailers like Amazon or eBay, and they do so because they have great confidence that they will get a better deal online then they would at the store. Therefore, when they’re met with a tempting deal at a store, they hesitate and choose to look it up and buy it online. Actively applying discounts and reward points will give that customer an emotional sensation to buy now, rather then later, will help your business win that sale immediately. E-Coupons and rewards can be used in conjunction with NFC enabled phones and apply automatic discounts and reward points when an enabled NFC phone is used as form of payment at the register. Such a feature is being rolled out with Google’s own offering of Google wallet and I recommend you take immediate action to differentiate yourself before it becomes the norm. Remember be proactive, not reactive. Customers always love to be rewarded without having to chase down discounts.

Compatible Websites: Make your website compatible to mobile web browsers.

Many of the huge retailers have already jumped on board with creating specific mobile applications pertaining to their company for the two larges phone ecosystems: Android and the iPhone. However, not everyone has an Android or an iPhone so creating many different types of applications for each specific mobile operating system can be expensive and time consuming, especially for smaller businesses. In addition, with the large pool of applications between Android and iPhone, only 1 of 4 applications downloaded actually get used. Therefore, when creating website for your company, make sure that your site is mobile browser friendly. Make things simple and accessible to customers without having them to zoom in on a page that’s meant for your laptop on a small 4 inch portable screen. In addition, if your website requires the user to fill out a form — for example loan applications — please make it mobile friendly. I can’t tell you how many times I started to fill out a form on my phone but just quit because it was just too much work.

Some of these tips sound like common sense but it will make you wonder why it isn’t a uniform standard across many retailers and companies. The truth is that the most of these initiatives will eventually become standard, but the key to your business is to be ahead of the curve and give your customer that friendly mobile experience and satisfaction they haven’t felt anywhere else.

Source: mobiThinking

According to research conducted by ZenithOptimedia in 2010 over $64 Billion was spent in 2010 on online advertising. Over 64% of this revenue went to only five companies; Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft, Facebook, and AOL. You can see the graph below for the full breakdown showing the percentage that each controls.

With such a large percentage of the market being cornered by a small number of businesses where should smaller businesses be putting their online advertising budget? Marketing via social media seems to be a popular choice as businesses are starting to allocate more of their marketing budget in to this portion of online advertising. Facebook is already #4 on this list, how much and how quickly will they be taking over market share in online ad spending?

Gas prices have dropped nearly a cent daily for the past 4 weeks according to a recent survey. Some states coming in at $3.00 per gallon, while California is still hovering the $4.00 mark. A major factor in gas prices are state tax. California and New York have tax rates of nearly $.50 per gallon which keep overall prices inflated.

Two other factors in gas prices are proximity of refineries and how much people can afford to pay.

Hopefully with gas prices lowering consumers will be more likely to purchase new vehicles! Leadpile has high demand for Auto Finance leads with high payouts. Contact your account rep or support@leadpile.net today for details.

Think about the last time you received excellent customer service.  We may get ok service, maybe good service and rarely great service, but excellent customer service, that is hard to come by.

Most the time we are helped by people who either:

• Just want to make a sale – and will do anything to get there
• Don’t care – have a lackluster approach to their job/goals
• Don’t know how to relate to their customer – or don’t care too

For a business that is dangerous.  How many times are you apt to go back to a business that provided that type of service?  I know that I wouldn’t.  So what can we do to ensure that our customers don’t receive bad customer service but instead get excellent customer service?  It can be done in these easy steps:

• Know your customer – their needs/goals/desires
• Listen to your customer – let them talk the majority of the time
• Be genuine with your customer – they know when your not being real
• Become your customer – put yourself in their shoes/relate to them

By doing those steps it shows our customers that we are interested in what they want, that we value them and that we appreciate their business. When we take the time to develop that customer relationship it will in turn make loyal customers that will equate to more sales for your business!  Remember, without our customers our businesses would not be successful.  So make it an aim to give EXCELLENT CUSTOMER SERVICE.

Sam Valenzuela, President of LeadPile

The demand to generate quality leads is a constant challenge for marketers. While 74% of marketers see generating high quality leads as their number one business challenge, LeadPile offers their customers just that–the highest quality leads. LeadPile is the premier online exclusive lead generation marketplace, and their commitment to quality and trust has earned them the title of one of the fastest growing companies in America.

LeadPile was created after recognizing a number of unfulfilled lead gen needs in the B2B sector, including the challenge of generating quality leads. By building their marketplace around balancing the needs of both lead buyers and sellers, LeadPile has grown into the largest online exclusive lead marketplace in the industry. Inc. Magazine has now ranked LeadPile as one of the fastest growing companies for a third consecutive year.

Currently lead gen is a top priority for 60% of marketers, which makes finding quality leads increasingly important. “Providing quality leads for our customers sits at the core of our vision,” said Sam Valenzuela, President of LeadPile. “A key ongoing objective is to develop processes that strengthen the quality of leads to bring real economic value to our clients.”

The future of lead quality lies within increasingly sophisticated segmentation, targeting and conversions.  LeadPile stands at the forefront of the lead gen industry by adapting marketplace features to meet changing market demands. Ultimately, it is the forward thinking approach to lead gen challenges that will continue to advance LeadPile as a leader in the industry.

ABOUT LEADPILE

LeadPile is the premier online lead marketplace for the B2B sector. LeadPile offers quality leads to buyers and sellers on a secure and centralized platform. Since 2009, Inc. Magazine has ranked LeadPile as one of the fastest growing companies in America. For more information about LeadPile, please visit LeadPile.com.

A new website has been created for Lending Season with new features and is targeted towards consumers with good credit, offering personal loans up to $35,000. In the current economy there are a lot of people in need of financing, and this includes people with high and low credit scores. Lending Season has created an option for consumers with good credit and giving them access to larger amounts of funding. These personal loans may be needed for home improvement projects, funding a small business, or a variety of other reasons that someone would need financing during these hard economic times. While Lending Season is targeting consumers with higher credit scores, it is understood that people with all types of financial backgrounds may be in need of extra financing. Lending Season also has options available for people with lower credit scores who would qualify for a short term cash advance. With the upgrades to the new website publishers are seeing much better results and higher EPCs  as we are seeing higher converting traffic from the site.

Your future business is determined by your current actions. The only thing we can control is what we do today. By taking care of your clients and their business when they need you most, you will have an open door for future opportunities. Never forget – clients come first. They are the reason for your success.

It is expected that Apple will announce today a new service called iCloud. The service is expected to allow consumers to store music online while transferring the data to their home PCs without connecting.

Apple has signed cloud-music licensing agreements with several music label recently that would allow consumers to stream music online while also downloading songs on iTunes.

The announcement is expected at 1pm set today at the annual Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco.

Both Google and Amazon have launched similar services recently.

In efforts to further improve the iPhones, maufacurers are putting together a metallic glass to replace the current models. The metallic part would prevent the phone from cracking or breaking as easily, while the glass components still maintain the strength.
This used to be a very expensive process for manufacturers, making it difficult to produce high volume of these products. Thanks to recent technological advances, they have found a process that costs about the same as it does to produce plastic. Although there are no finalized plans yet, the idea is being entertained and may be a feature of the phone in the future making it much more durable and  without ridiculous prices.

It seems that a lot of people in the state of Washington are concerned over the internet lending industry, but my worries are that they are not doing enough research before applying for an online payday loan. Just as in Washington,there are businesses all around the internet that are not legitimate. It is the job of consumers to educate yourself if you are providing your personal information to a website. There are numerous legitimate websites out there (including Leadpile’s) that allow a consumer to securely request a payday loan. If you are a consumer and needing that extra short term cash, do your homework on the website you are filling out your information and make sure you are completing an online form that is secure. If there are issues in WA, there are potentially issues all over the US, but a lot of this lies with the consumers and knowing what you are doing. Knowledge is power for consumers!