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Many people use Google Alerts as a automated tool for acquiring news stories and doing research on various topics. You can even use Google Alerts to search for job or business opportunities. Place 2 to 3 words within "quotes" for each alert. Then you automatically receive an email with results found anywhere on the Internet. You can use Google Alerts to track how your company fares in the public eye or keep up with friends, family and associates. Just create an alert with their name in quotes.

Former New York City Mayor Koch endeared himself to people with his famous line "How am I doing?". That's a question you can and should answer about yourself, using Google Alerts. What do hiring managers, human resource professionals, recruiters or business associates see when they type your name into Google or any search engine?

By creating different Google Alerts with different variations of your name spelling, you receive feedback on what type of information people are viewing about you. This also provides intelligence on whether you should make adjustments to profiles you may have on Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, or articles mentioning you or your company name etc.. Oh did you think that information about you was private? Think again.

Your web presence should reflect the name you use on your resume or bio. Google Alert intelligence is also valuable, if you have a similar name to someone else. Talk about a case of mistaken identity, if that person has a less than acceptable Internet web presence. Consider making your name more unique by adding a middle initial, generation qualifier or certification distinction (i.e. Al Q. Brown - Jim Smith, III - C. E. Reid, CSI).

Related article: "5 Quick Ways to Grow your Internet Web Presence"

Find Out What Others Are Saying About Your Business

Gee. I wish I could be in on the ground floor of the next technology tsunami. Shoot. I missed that opportunity. Bugsy Segal looked out in the desert and saw opportunity that became Las Vegas. Thomas Edison found over 900+ ways not to make a light bulb, until his patience and persistence paid off. Sitting at his desk as an ordinary office worker, Rod Colon's extraordinary vision with millions of people leveraging human social networking to self empower the masses for success, has impacted many lives globally. William H. (Bill) Gates III worked in a garage to develop a piece of software that changed the fortunes and lives of every person on earth.

Microsoft's surface computing technology will revolutionize the way people live and work. Surface computing will do what the telephone did for communication and what television did for engaging the masses. Everyday input devices are history, with their selfish way of taking up precious desk space. Any mechanical object that moves will eventually break. No more computer mouse, keyboard, scanner, credit card readers etc.. Which means there is a money savings on replacements or repairs. The main input devices for surface computing are our fingers and our imagination.

Based on how surface computing works with proven technology components, it has a serious potential to create opportunities for teachers, product designers, lawyers, test engineers, building superintendents, business administrators, doctors, product managers, restaurant/office workers, program managers, travelers, software engineers, taxi drivers, people who entertain at home, recruiters, sales/marketing persons, hotel workers and many other professions.

Wake up software developers who think your skills are tight. Now is the time to get hot with developing applications for surface computing. And you too entrepreneurs that call yourself visionaries. Pick up the phone and call your investor angels that you brag about to friends, as being available in your trusted network.

Investors are not off the hook either. Is your investment portfolio complete by including surface computing? Let's talk if you're interested in exploring the potential.

Are you an Entrepreneur considering another profit center? No one is suggesting you delineate away from your core profit centers. Consider putting together a consortium of investors and/or distributors that "want in" on a sure bet. Laugh, if you will. Then those with the "show me" mindset can cry later when the surface computing market successfully saturates.

Microsoft Surface - Exclusive Review


Microsoft Surface at the Rio in Las Vegas

by Bruce Newman

Affiliate marketing is usually defined as the reward for each customer brought to a target website; in short, an Internet-based marketing method of driving traffic to a particular site. To clarify this further, let’s say I’m an affiliate for a website that sells pet products. For each customer who I bring to that website, I will receive some reward – usually money. (This may also require that they purchase at least one item.)

Is it worth my while?
The answer is both yes and no. It depends on the terms of the affiliate agreement and the amount of effort you are willing to expend. If it was so easy for these companies to just bring in business, they wouldn’t need an affiliate program. However, every company knows that generating new business is hard; it’s expensive, time consuming, exhausting and a slow process. They have calculated that it helps to have an unpaid (or minimally paid) sales force providing them with leads (and customers). The question for you to determine is, “Are the rewards worth my effort?”.

What is required from me?
Sometimes being an affiliate can initially be very easy and profitable. If you have a network of friends with a need for the affiliate product or service that you represent – such as pet supplies, you can easily make a few dollars. But what happens then? What is required for you to continue to provide new customers? And, how will you do it? These are questions you must be able to answer before becoming an affiliate of any program.

How much money can I make?
You can make a lot of money as an affiliate, particularly if you are an affiliate member for several websites and have an effective operating strategy. Having a solid networking tree is also quite helpful. Unfortunately, few affiliates fall into this category. Some affiliates enjoy a solid secondary income stream. However, most affiliates make little to no money, usually because of a lack of effort or difficulties with the company they are an affiliate for. We will discuss this further in another article.

Why become an affiliate?
Being an affiliate can supply you with a secondary source of income. Even if you are employed in a job, an affiliate income can make a significant difference in your total income. Possibly, as you continue to refine your strategies and affiliate agreements, it can even become a primary source of income. In any case, it requires work on your part. Just remember, money won’t come rolling in once you sign up as an affiliate without your effort.

Next week, we will discuss how to select an affiliate program(s) from the many programs currently available.

Bruce Newman is a long-term ETP Network member and Vice President at The Productivity Institute, LLC which matches the specific software products and services needs of companies to rated outstanding consultants who can meet those needs. It has an extensive and well-supported affiliate program that offers up to $225 for each company that registered by an affiliate which signs a contract with one of its referred consultants. Additional product and service information is available at: http://www.prodinst.com

Video Affiliate Marketing Part 1

1. Create and name folders off your Inbox. Each folder will display underneath the Inbox
   
2. Set the rules or filters to automatically place incoming emails into appropriate folders

Are you ready for this? Now you can thumb your nose at all suppliers of oil around the world. No more reliance on Mobil Oil, Exxon, Citgo, Hess, British Petroleum (BP), Venezuela, Middle East, OPEC or any other oil cartels. Ethanol fuel is ethyl alcohol, the same type of alcohol found in alcoholic beverages. As a fuel, it is a biofuel alternative to gasoline, and is widely used in cars in Brazil. Because it is easy to manufacture and process, and can be made from very common materials such as sugar cane, it is steadily becoming a promising alternative to gasoline throughout much of the world.

How about having your own gas pump in your own back yard or driveway? Does fuel at around $1.00 a gallon sound good? And the U.S. Treasury Department actually provides a free permit to allow small property owners to make up to 10,000 gallons of their own fuel.

Drum roll please . . . Efuel100 is taking orders for 2008 4th quarter deliveries of the first home ethanol micro fueling system. Efuel100 is also offering money making opportunities for people to become dealers or investors. The EFuel100 Microfueler apparently works by mixing table sugar with ethanol yeast mix. The MicroFueler has a distillation-only mode, which allows the consumer to convert discarded beer, wine or distilled drinks into ethanol. Any combination of discarded alcohol can be poured directly into the MicroFueler fermentation tank to be converted into ethanol.

Beyond the prospectus, do your homework before investing in any emerging technology. I will, because what Efuel100 is offering provides 3 exciting opportunities. I want in.

Make Your Own Ethanol At Home with the Efuel 100 MicroFueler


More Efuel100 Videos

With the Internet, social networks have provided powerful platforms for business networking, making million dollar deals and accelerating your professional career into fast forward. Social networks can also be very scary places that produce unwanted devastating results that impact our everyday lives. Be proactive about protecting your business reputation, your children and your family. Spend a little time learning safety tips for being on MySpace and Facebook.

Introduce Your Child to Business with Hotshot Game
Forget those shoot em up, aliens and race car games. This is a fun fast paced game that gives kids skills they can use for life. Hot Shot Business is a simulation game for budding entrepreneurs, where kidscan open their own spa, skateboard factory or comic shop.

Teenagers and Young Adult Aspiring Entrepreneurs

Gazillionaire is the award-winning simulation game. Explore new worlds, build your business, and make a fortune. Gazillionaire is full of memorable characters and exotic places to visit. You'll run your own company, manage a feisty crew, and, if you're clever enough, make billions of kubars!

JA Titan
Test your skills running a business in this ultimate business simulation! As CEO, you will match wits in the competitive, technologically advanced industry of the Holo-Generator.

JA Worldwide™ (Junior Achievement) partnered with the Best Buy® Children’s Foundation to launched JA Titan. Set in the year 2035, JA Titan creates a world in which players are CEOs of their own companies. Originally conceived in the 1980s as the Management and Economic Simulation Exercise, or MESE, JA Titan is a widely recognized business simulation for high school students.

JA Titan version 3.0 incorporates the concept of charitable giving, challenges students with sub-decisions, and adds voices to the characters, among other improvements.

Cashflow Game by Robert Kiyosaki
This is a game for Tweens or Young and Mature Adults. earn how to get out of the Rat Race and onto the Fast Track where your money works for you instead of you working hard for your money. Use this game to practice real world investing with play money!

CASHFLOW® 101 is an educational board game that teaches accounting, finance, and investing at the same time - and makes learning fun.

"Move over Monopoly. A new board game that aims to teach people to be rich is gaining fans the world over." -The New York Times article on the CASHFLOW games



Adult Aspiring Entrepreneurs

Informist Business Simulation Game
Informatist is a revolutionary online multiplayer Business Simulation -- a business game with a difference. Informatist is ideal for budding entrepreneurs and veteran tycoons alike. Test your business skills against hundreds of other players running thousands of companies.

The Informatist Game will sharpen your business skills as you play to win in five different categories. Experience the ups and downs of 16 dynamic business areas. Hire employees, set salaries, set product price, manage inventory, buy and sell land, trade stock, make business deals and dominate markets by applying the right resources at the right time. Do you have what it takes to succeed against cutthroat business competition? Find out in this unique business simulation!

SimVenture
SimVenture is ideal for anyone wanting to learn about business and enterprise. The software can be used in a range of environments where people are learning about business and want to develop entrepreneurial skills.

Run your career like a business. This includes personal expenses. If you do not receive the service you pay for, tell the vendor service provider.

All cell phone service providers sincerely want to keep you as a customer. They will do whatever it takes to ensure your loyalty, month after month. This includes giving you money you are entitled to, as long as you ask for it. Your contract appears to lean more in the direction of your financial responsibilities, which makes each of us feel helpless. Get over it.

Similar to the employee hand book, there are more unwritten rules than there are written rules. As I tell my business career coaching clients "Learn the rules. Then make the rules work for you". This means you are in the driver's seat, as long as you pay attention to your monthly cell phone bill. Don't expect major money for each instance, but it can add up over a 12 month period. I received about $275 in service credits in the last 14 months, for various "no service" issues.

Every person has a different cell phone plan. Be very clear about the various services your cell phone plan covers. Write it out:

• Phone service
• Text message / SMS
  
• Email
• Internet Browsing
• Downloading services
• Unlimited plans
• Being able to call people with the same service provider, at no cost
• International vs. U.S. services (calling, email etc.)
• Minute usage draw down on accessing voice mail

1. Note the first date of the service failure
2. Keep track of all the time for the service outage
   
3. Call your cell phone service provider
4. Get the customer representative to create a help desk request and provide you with the help desk request number
5. Get the representatives name and or ID number - note it down
   
6. Call every day until the issue is resolve
7. Once the issue is resolved "ask for a pro-rated credit for the time the service(s) is down". It does not matter if it is 1 hour or 10 days. Ask for a credit. You might be surprised at the response.
   

• For 6 months 2 different people had no signal in the building where they worked. For 8 hours a day for six months they could not send or receive phone calls on their cell phone. Each month each person paid the full bill, despite not receiving full service. After I suggested they call their provider for credit, each company representative said "no problem". 1 person received a $260 credit and the other person received a $280 credit. Two different credit amounts, for the same issue, tells you each customer service representative is empowered to make "judgement calls".
• Before traveling outside the U.S., I had my phone turned for being able to send/receive emails. The international fee was $19 a month. I went on vacation for a week, but 4 months later I was still paying the $19 per month. I forgot to turn the service off. I called my service provider and they credited 3 months back to my account.
  
• How about being late with paying a bill. The cell phone company turns off outgoing call capability for whole week. Once the bill is paid for the current period outage, ask for a credit. Why? The cell phone service provider is turning your current service off, for a previous bill from a service they previously provided. Be sure to explain that logic to them. Cell phone companies make million$ just from the shear ignorance of people.
  
• My cell phone provider was upgrading a cell tower in the neighborhood where I was working at a client site. For 8 hours a day I couldn't receive or make calls and I could not send/receive email on my Blackberry phone. I called every day and once a week I called to get a credit. Each week I received a $15 credit. Each week I was also told this is a "one time" credit. I said no problem, but I repeated the process every week any way. So that was $15 X 7 = $105. That equals a little more than 1 month of free service. 7 different representatives making excellent judgement calls.