The LuxMob Info Tags

For a long time when I would go looking at fishing rods I would get confused by the various desigations on the labels. It wasn’t the lure weights that were confusing, it was the designations such as: Ultra-Light, Medium, Heavy, Slow, Fast, etc. After doing some research I sorted out the designations and came to a better understanding of how rods are classified. These designations don’t apply to fly rods, they have there own system for classifying the fly-rod weight and action. Rods are classified by two factors: the range of lure weights, and the amount of flex in the rod when it is loaded with the lure.

The rod weight is a pretty straight forward designation. It uses such terms like Ultra-Light, Light, Medium, Medium-Heavy, and Heavy. So a heavy action rod would probably have a lure weight range starting at 1oz and going up from there, while an Ultra-Light may have a lure range that starts at 1/32 oz and goes up to maybe 1/8oz. You probably get the idea.

The rod action is a little different. As I said earlier, it classifies the amount of the rod that flexes when it is loaded with a lure. The general designations are Slow, Medium, Fast, and Extra-Fast. Manufacturers may use some variation on the the wording, but their words should translate into this basic system. Slow action rods flex across the entire length of the rod up to the grips. Medium action rods flex over about the upper half of the rod, Fast action rods flex over only about one-third of tip, and Extra-Fast rods flex over only about one-fourth of the tip. Each type of action has its application and different people may use different actions for the same purpose.

Personally I prefer to use a Fast, or Extra-Fast action rod for most fishing. If I am jig, or texas-rigging I prefer to use an Extra-Fast tip for the sensitivity. If I am mojo-rigging I prefer a fast action because it allows the fish to load the rod before I set the hook. I very rarely use a slow action rod although they do see a lot of use. The “Noodle” type rods used by Steelhead fisherman would be considered a slow action rod. They allow the fisherman to use lighter line while fishing because the rod help cushion the load on the line. One note, however, the slower the action of the rod, the harder it is to get a good hookset because less force is applied directly to the fish.

I hope this has shed a little light on rod action and rod weight. I know the research taught me quite a bit.

MichFish.com Michigan Fishing Information, Articles, Online Fishing Maps, Online Member Diary, and Forums

The Internet flower industry is booming, and there is great competition. There is no guarantee that the flowers you will order will be high quality or fresh when delivered. Most floral vendors online are genuine service providers, but there are a few who do not meet the industry standards. It is much better to shop through a trusted and reputed florist. FTD is the logo to look for.

FTD is the largest international floral service provider synonymous with quality and trust. FTD (Florists Transworld Delivery) connects about 20,000 retail floral vendors in North America alone and has a delivery network of more than 50,000 affiliated florists worldwide. The FTD logo confirms that the flowers you order will be the freshest, and the delivery will be on time. FTD florists have a definite edge over other florists online with more than a 95% consumer awareness and satisfaction guarantee.

A few key features of FTD flowers are that their delivery is on the same day of ordering, and the quality of your product is never compromised. Most FTD florists use the latest technology available in the industry, which makes their service supreme. This efficiency leads to complete customer satisfaction.

Many FTD florists stock a large variety of flowers including exotic plants, artificial flowers and other gift items. Some even boast of in-house designers catering to individual demands. All FTD florists offer a money back guarantee if the floral arrangement received does not meet their quality standards. Just remember that ordering early does not guarantee anything, since flowers are delivered fresh.

In its simplest form a voice mail system is essentially just another phone answering system. They store their messages on a computer disk. Each user is assigned a mailbox where they only have access to his or her messages. They are also password protected so only the assigned user can access the messages in their mailbox. Voice mail systems also allow each user to create their own greeting message. This enables the user to pass on instructions or important messages without taking the call.

Voice mails systems are usually additional features of existing in house phone systems. When deciding which voice mail system to purchase you need to look at two key aspects of each one: the number of user ports and the hours of memory that is allocated to messages.

A good voice mail system will have enough ports to handle incoming calls without delay. If all the ports are full, then any new callers will be delayed in the system until a port becomes available. If a voice mail system has too many ports then its capacity is wasted. The trick is to balance the number of ports with the estimated number of potential customers.

The capacity of a voice mail system depends on the hours of memory it has available. A system with a large number of ports and traffic may need a large number of hours, where as a system with low traffic will need fewer hours. The term hours of memory refers to capacity of a voice mail system to store any messages.

Thanks for reading.

Jason

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Jason Morris is co-author, search engine optimization and marketing consultant of Business Phone Systems Direct. Specialists in the supply and installation of business phone systems and accessories.
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Windows Media Player 10 has been full of bugs from Microsoft since they offered it as a download from their site. Windows Media Player 9 was nice and simple. Windows Media Player 10 is way too complex and feature-rich that it has taken away from the simpleness of version 9 and ruined itself. Another great media player is Winamp but we won’t go into that right now.

If you have installed Windows Media Player 10, you can roll back to the version of the Player that was on your computer before installing Windows Media Player 10.

To roll back from Windows Media Player 10 to a previous version, do the following:

• In Control Panel (Category View), click Add or Remove Programs.
• Click Remove a program

Now do one of the following:
If you are running Windows XP Service Pack 2, select the Show updates check box (at the top of the list), click Windows Media Player 10 (in the Windows Updates section), and then click Change/Remove.

If you are running Windows XP Service Pack 1 or earlier, click Windows Media Player 10, and then click Change/Remove.

As of writing this many people have found bugs in WMP10 that make it unavailble for common audio and video files. If you find that WMP10 is crashing or giving you errors and you cant play your media files. Uninstall it with these directions and stay happy.

Be like the rest of the world and install Winamp.

Ken Savage is a Webmaster employee who writes about what is going on in the Tech industry usually days before it breaks to the rest of the world. He can be found at http://www.kensavage.com

Sometimes a freelance writing career can feel very much like “feast or famine”.

At the very beginning, it’s almost all famine. You spend more time looking for freelance writing jobs than you spend actually writing, and, quite apart from being utterly demoralizing, when you have a mortgage to pay and mouths to feed, it can be absolutely terrifying, too.

Of course, once you get past those early days of struggling for work and start to build up a portfolio and a reputation, you move into the “feast” era of your freelance writing career and everything should be rosy.

The problem is however, that those early days can be hard to forget. You can’t help but remember the days of living off ramen noodles while trying to get your freelance writing career off the ground, and there’s no way in hell you want to go back there. Like Scarlett O’Hara you vow never to be poor or hungry again - and so you accept every single assignment that comes your way, and end up working yourself into a greasy spot at the same time.

Rather than a feast, it starts to become a binge, and before you know where you are, you’re struggling again - albeit this time you’re struggling to get the work done, rather than to find it in the first place. Your home life and health starts to suffer, and, if you’re not careful, so does the quality of your work.

So what do you do?

Well, if you think you could be on the verge of a writing binge, here are a few tips:

1.Dump your toxic clients

Toxic clients are the ones who cost you more in terms of time and effort than you ever get back from them in dollars. These are the clients for whom everything is a problem: they’re not happy unless they’re complaining, and you end up spending more time coddling and cajoling them than you do working for them. At the start of your career, you’ll probably just put up with the toxicity. Once you start to get busy, however, it’s time to get rid. If a toxic client feels like more trouble than they’re worth, they probably are: so dump them, and stick with the ones who actually reward your effort.

2.Look carefully at your prices

How much are you charging? Writers who are new to freelancing are often tempted to reduce their prices in order to secure work. This can work very well; once you’re more established in your field, however, it can start to backfire on you, because once you have a reputation for being good and cheap, you’ll end up with more work than you can reasonably handle. If this sounds like you, it may be worth considering accepting fewer projects, but charging a higher rate for them. That way the quality of your work and life remains high, and you still have the opportunity to increase your earnings.

3.Learn how to say no gracefully

Turning down work can be frightening. No matter how successful you are, when you’re a freelance writer there’s always going to be a little voice whispering in your ear that although you’re doing well this month, next month the work could dry up. While it’s never a good idea to become complacent, you do need to learn when to switch this voice off. If you’re good at what you do, and you’ve built up a strong portfolio and network of contacts, there will be more work. Sometimes it’s better to turn a project down than to take it on when you don’t have time for it - and risk your reputation by doing it badly.

4.Make friends with your competitors

Yes, really. Your fellow freelance writers don’t always have to be “the competition”. If there’s another freelancer in your area, or in your field of expertise, why not contact them when it’s busy and offer to recommend them to the clients you don’t have time for, on the understanding that they do the same for you next time they’re busy and you’re not? This kind of reciprocal arrangement can work out very well for both parties: it means that you’re not having to flat-out refuse work, for one thing, and it also gives you something of a safety net if things suddenly get slow, but your competitor’s workload is more than they can handle.

About the Author

Amber McNaught is a freelance writer and editor, and the owner of WritingWorld.org, an online agency for freelance writers, editors and proofreaders.

1) Is it an essential component to your sales mission or just an ingredient in the recipe?

List 10 actions, routines or tasks that are part of your sales day and considered essential components of your sales process.

Now, ask yourself. How many of these are essential components to my sales mission are just ingredients in the recipe?

Think about a professional golfer’s essential competencies from tee-off to last putt. Is the ball and club a core competency, or is it the golf swing and putting stroke? What about a basketball player with the essential competency of passing, dribbling, and shooting?

2) Can it be measured routinely and accurately?

A Core Competency is a definable entity that is related to performance and results.

Ask yourself. Can I measure this with a napkin, pencil, and calculator? Can I put it on one piece of paper and be able to evaluate the status of my business? Do this first. You can always transfer it later to the million-dollar sales automation system.

Can you apply a universal performance benchmark that is realistic and assures revenue goals individually and collectively?

3) You know you have achieved this when you can tell a sales recruit during the interview process the (3) simple numbers that will assure them success.

Have you identified the ‘Key Performance Indicators’ in your sales process?

A good KPI example in the sales process might be how many times you advance the first sales appointment to the next phase, whether that’s a demonstration, a site visit, a survey or a proposal. Another KPI is how many times you gain a new customer once the first gateway is passed. And when you do gain a new customer, what’s the average revenue you achieve? That’s certainly an important KPI. Because if your average revenue per sale is 40% less than the average peer KPI, you might want to find out why and take focused action to improve it, as you’re leaving money on the table.

And what about the length of a sales cycle in days? Is that conditional or do you have a degree of control over it? If you have a team member that has an average sales cycle 30% shorter than the peer group, uncover and assimilate those best practices out to the rest of the sales team. Less time, more results. That makes ‘Sales Cycle’ a valuable KPI.

Once you have your KPI averages you will be able to communicate to a sales recruit exactly how much sales activity (new appointments per week) is required on their part to successfully ramp to Quota is a pre-determined amount of time. That’s right, a ‘Pre-determined amount of time in days’.
And that will shorten the time to Quota and reduce the Hard-dollar cost of Turnover from low appointment activity.

But don’t assume they can do it on their own. Provide them with a training ‘System’ to help them achieve the activity routinely and effectively.

4) Can it be determined operationally that you’re performing similar business activities better than your competitors?

Strategy is the ‘what’ and tactics are the ‘how.’ If you are superior in operational effectiveness, you will tactically perform better than your peers and competitors. This works a lot like the outcome of a football game. The winning team almost always outperforms their opponent in fundamentals like “Blocking and Tackling.”

5) Can you apply “Timely Training” and “Powerful Routines” around each core competency?

We know what training is, but do we understand why training fails? Timely Training is having appropriate structures for learning and application, defining useful short-term objectives, measuring results, and working closely with qualified trainers for follow-up and support. Most importantly, there must be organizational commitment. Focus on one core competency at a time until a pre-determined benchmark result is realized. Don’t move on or over until you do. Powerful Routines are linked to selling scenarios and allow you to dust off all the bases and then cover all of them to have the highest ratio of success aligned with each situation.

Jeff Hardesty is President of JDH Group, Inc. and the Developer of the X2 Sales System®, a blended training system that teaches sales professionals the competency of setting C-level business appointments.

Jeff has been featured in numerous National publications such as Business First, Dartnell’s SELL!NG , Chief Learning Officer and Training Magazine with reference to Blended Learning Systems and improving sales teams Key Performance Indicators.

He travels the country conducting live X2 ‘Boot Camps’ and Train-the-trainer sessions helping sales organizations get more reps to Quota in less time, shorten new-hire ‘Ramp-to-Quota’ and eliminate Turnover costs due to low sales activity.
Jeff can be reached at jeff@convertmoresales.com.

To view a complimentary suite of sales training ROI calculators and determine your sales team’s Key Performance Indicators in line with your sales objectives visit http://convertmoresales.com/roi_calculators.php

Summer is often a time when we let things slide and neglect maintaining any sort of schedule. But this year, try to establish a summer reading routine. It will help maintain the reading growth your children have made throughout the year. Here are a few ways to make reading part of your children’s summer:

Commit to setting aside fifteen minutes each evening to reading. Turn the television off and have the whole family sit down and read. Even if it’s reading a newspaper, you’re sending the message that reading is an important skill to develop. This is also a good time to read aloud to small children who are learning to read themselves.

Visit the library periodically. Help your children select books to read or want read aloud to them. This is also an excellent opportunity to teach your children how the library is organized. If your children are older, teach them how to use the computerized card catalogue as well. If you need help, ask the librarian.

From time to time, take excursions to the bookstore. Help your children choose books from the vast selection in the “great summer reads” displays. While you’re there, set a good example and pick up a book for yourself.

Take an interest in the books your children are reading. Ask questions such as: why did you choose that book, what do you like best so far, where does it take place, who are the main characters, what’s the problem in the story, will you read more stories by this author?

There’s nothing more boring for kids than long road trips. Make sure you pack books. If your children are small, read aloud to them in the car on the way to your summer vacation spot. If you have older children, have them read to the younger ones. Everyone needs to pack a book, including Mom and Dad.

Summer is often hectic with summer camps, sports and family vacations. But you can still establish a daily reading time, and it will be well worth it. Chances are, with daily reading, your children won’t just maintain their current reading levels, they will improve their overall reading proficiency. And won’t that be a terrific way to start the school year next fall?

Carol Boles has a master’s degree in Special Reading and an Educational Specialist degree in Curriculum and Instruction. She has over ten years experience teaching K-12 reading in public schools. She now manages her own business and is a member of The Lieurance Group, a freelance writer’s cooperative. Find out more about her writing services at http://www.lieurancegroup.blogspot.com or email her at Cwrites-56@hotmail.com

While reading about Antonio Gates being voted the only unanimous
Pro-Bowl selection, I got to thinking about the Charger’s
season. A season so filled with hope and high expectations. Can
anyone really say that this is not one of the eight best teams
in football? How could this team not have made the playoffs?
Sure they played a brutal schedule that saw them travel to the
Eastern time zone an unprecendented four times but when it’s all
said and done, 2005 will go down in Charger history as a year of
missed opportunities.

The season season got off to a rocky start with the holdout of
Antonio Gates. There is plenty of blame for both parties here.
The Chargers were right to hold the line against the already
under contract Gates. The free agent basketball player from Kent
was well within his rights (based on performance) to expect a
better long term deal.

The situation was handled very poorly by both sides with Gates
ultimately suspended by the team for four games for not
reporting. Gates, who received a $7000 signing bonus in 2003 and
was scheduled to make the league 3-yr minimum of $380,000,
eventually signed a six-year deal worth a reported 30 million
(10 million guaranteed) but the dameage was done. Gates would
miss the Charger opener vs. Dallas.

Week One: Dallas 28 San Diego 24 - With Gates sitting out the
final game of his suspension, the Cowboys were able to stack the
box holding LaDanian Tomlinson to just 72 yards. Three Drew
Bledsoe TD passes, the final with 3:06 to play, downed the
Chargers in their home opener.

Week Two: Denver 20 San Diego - The Chargers took a 14-3 lead to
the lockerroom at halftime but could only manage 41 second half
yards. Champ Bailey came up with a pick in the final five
minutes and Ron Dayne’s 38 fourth quarter rushing yards set up a
Jason Elam FG with five seconds left. The Chargers had dug
themselves an 0-2 hole.

Week Five: Pittsburg 24 San Diego 22 - The Steelers, off a
surprise loss to New England and also off their bye, got a
40-yard FG from Jeff Reid with six seconds left to win the
Monday nighter. An LT TD with 4:42 left gave San Diego a 22-21
but Tomlinson was stuffed on the conversion setting up a final
drive by Roethlisberger.

Week Seven: Philadelphia 20 San Diego 17 - The Chargers overcame
an early 10-0 deficit to lead 17-10 and were ready to ice the
game with a FG with just 2:25 remaining. After failing to
convert a fourth-and-one, Nate Kaeding’s kick was blocked and
returned 65 yards for the Eagle win. Tomlinson was held to just
seven yards on 17 carries. At this point, San Diego is 3-0 in
games when LT has 20 carries and 0-4 when he doesn’t.

Week Fourteen: Miami 23 San Diego 21 - In classic look ahead,
Chargers never show up, never get going, and are handed a third
home loss by the Dolphins led by Gus Frerotte. The Chargers had
won five straight in dominating fashion before forgetting they
had a game before meeting the then undefeated Indianapolis
Colts. The Chargers clearly had their backs against the wall.

The Chargers easily handled the Colts on the road but it was
still win or go home as the Bolts headed to Arrowhead to meet
the equally desperate Chiefs.

Week Sixteen: Kansas City 20 San Diego 7 - Larry Johnson rushed
for 131 yards and two scores and the Charger offense could get
nothing going as they were officially eliminated from the
playoffs. The Chiefs extended their December home win streak to
18 and Johnson rushed for 100 yards for the eighth straight
time.

Week Seventeen: Denver 23 San Diego 7 - With nothing on the line
for either team, this yawner was played as if both teams were
comatose and double-parked. Adding insult to injury, Drew Brees
dislocated his shoulder near the half with Phillip Rivers seeing
first real action in two years and going 12-22 for 115 and an
interception.

Clearly there will be changes as the Chargers head into next
year. The Bolt front office has already made it clear that they
want to keep both Brees and Rivers. They’ll also need more
player on defense, particularly in a secondary that has cost
them dearly in this two-year resurgence.

The Chargers first five losses were by a combined fourteen
points with all five games being decided in the final five
minutes, two on the final play. Each of those games was
extremely winable, and one could argue that had the Chargers had
some character, their December 18th meeting with the Colts could
have featured two unbeatens. All in the course of a year for a
squad whose highlight will would be aptly titled, “The season of
Missed Opportunities”.

Too many people venture online without understanding which type
of Internet business they are best suited to. They either go for
the first one they come across that promises early wealth, or,
having viewed a few options (without gaing any real insight on
what exactly each one will deliver), they hurl themselves at
several simply because they can’t make a choice.

Both of these strategies is dangerous. The first, because any
site that promises pots of cash early with very little work is
nothing more than a scam (1000’s of people have lost money to
these schemes) and the second because if you try running too
many ventures too soon you’ll spread yourself thin and be unable
to devote necessary time to a single opportunity.

There are many legitimate ways to make money online and
discovering which one is best for you is an excercise well worth
taking some time over.

In part one of this series you posed 4 questions to yourself:

1. How computer literate am I? (not at all - 1, very - 5) 2. How
is my self-discipline? (bad - 1, excellent - 5) 3. How positive
is my outlook on life? (terrible - 1, bright - 5) 4. How much
can I afford to fail? (Can’t - 1, Doesn’t matter - 5)

And answered each of them with a score of 1 to 5 accordingly.

These four simple questions were carefully worded and directed
at understanding not necessarily *which* business you should go
for, but whether indeed you should look for an income online at
all. No matter what you’re told by all the get-rich-quick sites
about how easy it is to make a residual income on the Internet,
or how your life will change as soon as you become a member of
their program, there will still be the necessity for some input
from you. In fact a lot of input from you - a lot more than they
ever let on in their sales copy.

Once you are signed up therefore, and you have experienced your
first few sessions working on your new ‘opportunity’, you will
then go through a period of disillusionment as it finally dawns
on you that alot more work is required than you originally
thought, and alot less income is forthcoming than you were
promised. Many people give up here, or go and find something
else and the whole process starts again.

You can save yourself this heart-break and inconvenience by
being honest with yourself at the start. Just take a moment to
write down an answer those four questions. (each one should be a
number from 1 to 5). Do it now before you read on.

So, lets see whether you should be pursuing an income online
after all. If you scored less than 8 then you shouldn’t even
think about it. With a score this low, you will definately not
have any success online and you’ll be wasting valuable time if
you try. With a score of 9-12 you might be OK but there will be
something that will have to change - perhaps you need a backup
plan so you can afford to fail a little more, or perhaps you
should brush up your computer literacy with a software course.
Maybe you marked yourself down on your positive outlook because
you were in a bad mood at the time. If that is the case on any
of the questions, revise the score to reflect your average
outlook over a number of months. (remember, there are no zeros
scored here).

With a score of 13-16 you should be good to go, and with
anything above 16 you’re either lying, or you should be kicking
yourself for not starting online sooner!

The Next Step.

Right, so once you know you’re OK to continue, your next step is
to research and critically assess the full range of options
available to you as a budding Internet Marketer.

In the next part of this series, we’ll examine each of the
money-making opportunities that exist online and identify
characteristics of each of them so that you can decide which
ones you’re best suited to.

Are you aware of how vitally important and valuable CONTENT is
to your online business? In fact, content can do more to build
your business and profits than just about any other resource or
service available.

Following is a list of 5 key ways that content can help build
your traffic, subscribers, and customers starting today!…

1. Boost your search engine ranking and daily visitor count by
posting keyword rich articles and content on your web-site. For
example, if your business involves offering products and
services related to fitness, posting fitness related articles
and content will attract unlimited prospective customers on a
regular basis!

2. Generate double or even triple the number of newsletter
subscribers you do currently, simply by offering content in the
form of “special reports” or manuals as bonuses for subscribing
to your publication. People love freebies, so give them what
they want and watch as your results increase!

3. Create an automated cashflow by using content to formulate
multi-part email training courses with related web-site or
affiliate links “sprinkled” throughout each course. Use an
autoresponder service to automate the delivery of your training
course (such as a 5 part training course delivered over a 5 day
period).

Training courses can also serve as excellent bonus offers for
your prospective newsletter subscribers.

4. One of the most important keys to a successful online
business is not JUST having a list of mailing list or newsletter
subscribers… It’s about building a trusting relationship with
your subscribers (ie, “cultivating” your list)…

By sending informative articles (content) to your list on a
regular basis you will establish yourself as an expert on your
topic of business, as well as gain the trust of your subscribers
over time. As a result, your subscribers will be EAGER to take
advantage of your “paid” product and service offers. (Just make
sure that you NEVER take advantage of the relationship you
develop with your list by offering products or services of poor
quality just to make a quick buck!)

If there is one “constant” in Internet marketing, it’s this: A
cultivated list of subscribers is as good as money in the bank.
Write that down and never forget it!

5. Another excellent way to generate no cost traffic is by
submitting ready-made articles to “content hungry” web-site and
newsletter publishers with your “resource box” attached. A
resource box is nothing more than a little 3-6 line “bio” about
you and/or your web-site - including a link to your site (or
even instructions on how to subscribe to your newsletter)…

When submitting or offering your article(s) for reprint
purposes, just make sure to specify that each article is to be
reprinted “as is” with your resource box attached.

…Even one article can go a LONG way towards generating no cost
traffic and visitors for you. Just imagine your article being
sent out to a newsletter subscriber base of 100,000 individuals
- many of whom will be reading YOUR included resource box and
clicking on your URL to learn more about what you have to offer!

Well there you have it, 5 sure ways to build your online
business exponentially with the help of articles and content…

With the declining effectiveness of many of the online
advertising methods that we’ve relied on in past years, content
is only strengthening its position as the ultimate KEY to
generating unlimited traffic, subscribers, and customers!