Have you ever thought, how you favourite web site would look like in case it is woman. Now you may find the answer. One of the leading FSBO sites - Fizber.com - published this article comparing the appearance and behaviour of 5 main real estate web-sites with the appearance and behaviour of women. A very interesting idea.
Types of Problems after the Sale
read more | digg story
At last I’ve found what I’ve been looking for. Many thanks to those who created this FSBO site (http://www.fizber.com/). I can find everything I need here. The thing is that I’ve decided to sell a house by owner and move to a new place (I’m going to get married very soon but my bf lives far away from me). At first I thought selling a house without a realtor wasn’t that difficult but now it appears to be much more complicated than I’ve expected.
The site impressed me by its clear layout and useful options, such as a “City Profile” which allows you to compare several cities in the neighborhood ( http://www.fizber.com/sale-by-owner-home-services/city-profiles.html) or, for example, an extremely helpful for me “Drive Score” where I can see what is situated nearby. I’ve been thinking about finding a place with all important services near the possible place of residence. But I couldn’t imagine myself driving a car with “Yellow pages” on my laps and finding such establishments and marking the map with special markers (black – for shops, white – for hospitals, green – for schools, for example). Using Drive Score ( http://drivescore.fizber.com/) I’ve found them all in one place. Give it a try and you’ll see what I mean.
Wow, and the FSBO database (http://www.fizber.com/) here is incredibly rich – more than I can find anywhere. I can choose what I want sitting at home with a cup of coffee without any necessity to deal with irritating (sometimes) real estate agencies or companies. I haven’t found yet what I’ve been looking for but I’m absolutely sure I will! Good job, guys!
I’ve noticed an interesting material about one of the biggest franchise of the Xxth century. Hope it’s interesing to the readers of this blog:
It wasn’t so long ago that the McDonald’s fast-food empire looked as stale as a burger left under a heat lamp too long.
Sales were decreasing, new products weren’t catching on and McDonald’s Corp. was vilified by consumer activists, nutritionists and others as Americans got fatter and fatter. Even its seemingly bulletproof stock staggered to barely $12 a share in 2003.
Now, thanks to a combination of improved menus, better marketing and deft management, business is cooking like never before.
The comeback may not be news to anyone who has queued up at a McDonald’s drive-through recently. But the fact that the sales resurgence not only continues to sizzle after more than four years but has spread internationally is a surprise to experts.
“A couple of years ago everyone was down on them,” said Bob Goldin, an analyst at Chicago-based food consultancy Technomic Inc.. “Now it’s hard to find people who are really hard critics of the company.”
The latest evidence of the brand’s renewed popularity came last week when the Oak Brook, Ill.-based company said August same-store sales rose a stellar 8.1 percent worldwide and exceeded the year-earlier total in U.S. restaurants for a 53rd straight month. Recent product introductions — premium coffee, snack wraps and salads — all contributed to the domestic surge.
Anti-Americanism over the Iraq war hasn’t eaten into global sales, either, despite the golden arches’ close association with Uncle Sam abroad. The increase was 12.4 percent in its Asia/Pacific, Middle East and Africa restaurants and a noteworthy 6.1 percent in Europe, where the turnaround didn’t take hold until recently.
“Consumers’ attention span is pretty short,” said Lakshman Krishnamurthi, a marketing professor at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. “As long as you have a good product that people like, people are going to go and eat it.”
Even shareholder activists have gone quiet after having the company on the defensive over its lagging stock price. Its stock has soared to all-time highs above $55 since it announced its largest-ever dividend increase Sept. 13 and pledged to return $15 billion to $17 billion to shareholders through dividends and share buybacks by the end of 2009.
Targeted in recent years by lawsuits claiming its food contributes to child obesity, McDonald’s remains vulnerable on nutritional issues. It took a public skewering from several books and movies: “Fast Food Nation,” “Super Size Me” and “Chew On This.”
McDonald’s lagged behind competitors and has moved slower than promised in switching to a cooking oil free of artery-clogging trans fat for its fries — a change it has yet to complete.
But industry observers credit it for adding healthier products such as entree-sized salads, fruit and yogurt parfait and grilled chicken sandwiches instead of just crispy, as well as apple slices and juice for kids.
“Let’s be honest, their business is still driven by burgers, fries and cokes,” said Goldin. “But consumers have options when they walk into those restaurants.”
Even a public health advocate who has called McDonald’s fries nutritionally “disastrous” and cringes at McGriddles breakfast sandwiches has grudging praise for the company’s changes.
“I think McDonald’s has recognized that nutrition is a very important issue to parents and others,” said Michael Jacobson, executive director of the nonprofit Center for Science in the Public Interest. “While they’ve added some junky foods to their menu, they’ve also added some healthier foods.”
McDonald’s also has heavily promoted its healthier menu choices even if salads are far outsold by double cheeseburgers. The options lampooned in “Super Size Me” are gone, nutritional information is available on its packaging as well as its Web site, and McDonald’s has been touting career opportunities at the company as a way of fighting the derisive “McJob” stereotype.
Those moves may all be clever marketing, but they’re also a sign of McDonald’s increasing responsiveness, according to industry observers.
“Before they didn’t necessarily want to acknowledge criticism,” said Morningstar analyst John Owens. “Now they’re meeting it head-on. I think consumers appreciate that.”
The McDonald’s executives who crafted the turnaround plan in early 2003 — then-CEO Jim Cantalupo, Charlie Bell and Jim Skinner — called for a sharper focus on what customers wanted, according to spokesman Walt Riker.
The strategy, which also has seen McDonald’s slow its international buildup, renovate U.S. restaurants and stay open later, is still maintained after Skinner became chief executive November 2004; Cantalupo died of a heart attack that April and Bell stepped down seven months later as he was dying of cancer.
“The most important thing is to listen to our customers,” Riker said. “That’s been a significant factor in our direction and revitalization.”
The company listens to its critics, too, and has tweaked its environmental, animal welfare and nutritional practices over the years in response to volleys from such groups as Greenpeace and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.
McDonald’s is currently wooing an even more important demographic — moms — in its quest to show its commitment to food quality and nutritional balance. A panel of moms visits its supplier facilities, restaurant kitchens and other sites to learn about its food quality.
Tonia Welling of Bentonville, Ark., who serves on the panel, has been won over. She says she and her family now have their own “Chicken Nuggets, Apples and Milk Night” at a local McDonald’s.
“I never would have thought of them as someplace to get healthy, fresh food,” Welling said Wednesday from Swedeboro, N.J., where she was touring a McDonald’s produce supplier. “I wasn’t aware of how much variety they have in what they offer.”
Joel Whalen, a marketing professor at DePaul University, said the McDonald’s brand is strong enough to suffer through slumps but the company has done a good job adding healthier options and advertising them loudly without straying too far from its burger-and-fries roots.
“Great brands remain true to their core,” he said. “You can’t go changing your image too much.”
Enterprises continue to adopt web technologies and ‘web 2.0′ trends, but there are two common threads to this adoption. One is that web technologies are step-by-step being adopted by enterprises, but they aren’t yet ready to usurp many desktop software apps. The Google Apps vs Microsoft Office debate currently raging is proof of that.
Some say that Web 2.0 is nothing more than just marketing approach to attract people to e-commerce. As for me I consider all that stuff (blogs, lenses, diggs and others) as a good way to express myself. It’s much more cost-effective, too!
read more | digg story
The article (or the lens as they say) is a summary of IDC report called “Eastern Europe ICT and Outsourcing Market (2007-2011)”. It can be interesting for those who are involved in information technologies business.
McDonalds Corp has finally selected a new trans-fat-free oil for cooking its famous french fries after years of testing. While it has developed a healthier new oil, the company is still not saying when it will be used in all 13,700 US restaurants. It already trails competitors in committing to a zero-trans fat oil.
I’ve found that story in Digg popular and was impressed how many people consider this as an interesting news. Once again McDonald’s shows itself as a leading franchise company. You may feel differently about their food but their business model is respect worth.
On the New Year eve I wish all franchise and non-franchise companies, their employers and employees, their families, relatives and friends all the best!
Let everything be OK in upcoming year. Let it bring a lot of profits and happiness, success and luck!
And thank everybody for reading and commenting my franchise thoughts!
I was not writing here for a long time as I was too busy with my new hobby – FOREX trading.
But studying Forex I found that there are not only traders but also special forex franchise companies that try to combine the benefits of both businesses – franchising and currency trading. It’s rather interesting and worth of deeper study as I think
http://de.betheboss.com/franchise.cfm?s_booth=899437 - - the link to the German company that says that they managed to do it!
By the way GLOBAL FOREX TRADING characterizes itself as FOREX franchise. But when I tried to find the word “franchise” using the search option on their site they said “Your search did not return any results.” 
The proverb says: “Tell me who your friend is, and I’ll tell you who you are”. I can say: “Tell me who your team members are, and I’ll tell you who you are”.
Think over the following questions:
Who are the team members?
Do you, the project manager, get to pick the team?
Or are you given a list of team members and expected to include them?
The next step in the Project Management process is to identify the people who will participate in the project.
Even if you have a rock-solid goal with clearly defined steps, you have little chance of succeeding without a group of people who possess the ability and perseverance to complete the steps; failure is imminent. Ensure that the project team can work together well and has the necessary skills to get the job done. Here’s a simple analogy to illustrate the point.
Suppose that you want to buy a franchise company that specializes in building bridges in remote locations. On the day of a new site survey for a bridge across a small canyon, every one of your engineers calls in sick. So, in a panic, you call the temp agency and ask to send over six of great engineers — pronto. To your delight, they arrive on time, and you fly them to the first potential site of the new bridge. When you point the engineers to the first possible bridge site, one of them pipes up, “You do realize that we drive trains, don’t you?”
Your company may have many talented people. Your job as a project manager is to identify the people who can finish tasks in the manner required and in the time allotted. Don’t consider including a technical wizard who returns from vacation the day the project is due. Don’t consider any potential team member who does not have the time to devote to the project. A great asset who can’t put the time and focus into a project is really not a great asset at all. Always consider all factors when determining whether a person can contribute to the team.
Ask questions! Remember: you don’t have all the answers. In fact, it’s extremely difficult to even know all the questions. (If you really do have all the answers, please e-mail me. I have some work for you.) Include proposed team member “interviews” as part of the selection process. You don’t have to hold a formal meeting. Sending an e-mail message or talking on the telephone works just as well. You just need to ask a few questions. Here are some questions you need to answer as you talk with prospective team members.
1. Are they available?
No one can do an adequate job if there is no time to work on a task. Overbooked, talented individuals are just as ineffective as available people with no skills. Be sure to explain what you need for your project and what the performance expectations are. Add at least 20 percent to any estimate you give. After setting proper expectations, ask for the person’s interest and availability. Make sure that each prospect’s supervisor agrees with this availability status before you make your final team selections.
2. Are they able?
Because you’ve outlined the whole project and listed all the individual tasks (don’t worry; we’ll go over how to do this later), you have a pretty good idea about what needs to get done. You know what you need from this prospect. Ask this person about her experience with similar tasks. If Stacey’s part of the project requires her to use a Dutch oven, it makes sense to find out if Stacey has ever used a Dutch oven. Ask earnest questions: “Stacey, your part in this project would be working with a Dutch oven. Tell me about your experience with Dutch ovens. What kind of dishes have you prepared with a Dutch oven? What kind of problems have you had cooking with a Dutch oven? If I asked you to cook a peach cobbler in a Dutch oven right now, could you do it? If not, what would you need to get the job done?”
3. Are they willing, eager, and optimistic?
The last thing your project team needs is a naysayer. There’s incredible momentum generated in a project when all the team members have good morale. It’s your job to keep the enthusiasm high. Don’t kill it from the start with a team member who doesn’t want to be on the team. Sometimes, you’re forced to put someone on the team, regardless of qualifications. In those cases, spend a little extra effort encouraging good morale and ensuring that any bad vibes don’t spread to other members. Simple positive reinforcement and recognition go a long way in such cases.
4. Do they have any questions?
Always remember to be quiet and listen at some point. Ask for any questions they have about the project. You can often uncover potentially damaging things you forgot by asking for input from other people. You can also get a good feel for what each team member considers important. Make notes of your conversations. Comments and questions at this phase can be very useful later in the project.
Keep in mind during these initial interviews that your purpose is to evaluate potential team members, not to select the team on the spot. Ask for any referrals and express genuine appreciation for their cooperation. Set a deadline for announcing the team and live up to it. The goal is to form a team for this project and have a pool of resources to draw from for later projects. It’s important to avoid alienating anyone during your team selection.
5. Inheriting a team
You may not have the luxury of selecting your own team. You may have the team member list handed to you. Do not skip the interviews! Even if you inherit a team, you still need to know what each member can do. The questions just covered can give you valuable insight into some cool skills available to you. You may also find that the team is incomplete. Ask to augment the team. Fill in the missing areas. Remember that you’re on the hook. If the project fails, it’s the project manager’s fault. Go in prepared.
If you do add new team members, take the time to make sure that each member feels equally important. You don’t want the original members to feel that you added to the team because you distrusted them. They were on the original team for some reason. Whether a team member made the team due to skill or being a relative of the CEO, use the skills you find.
The success of the project reflects directly upon you, the project manager, so make every effort to assemble the best team you can.
After you’ve outlined the process and set your team, you’re ready to draw the 20,000-foot view.
Don’t overlook the importance of personality to team composition. You may be spending lots of time together. Build the team with interesting and stimulating folks (as long as they fit your selection criteria) and you’ll be more productive - and have lots more fun!