I’ve been meaning to write this post for several days now, ever since I read an article in our Las Vegas Review Journal dated Monday, February 16th. In fact, it’s been sitting on my desk just waiting for the right moment to go from paper pile to post.

What really caught my attention was the headline, “Cultural differences: Economic values may explain why businesses owned by Chinese-Americans are faring well in the recession.”

We see all too often people pulling away from the very thing they should be doing during down times or slow times or tough times – especially online. The energy exerted to build a business is tamped down (or shut down) in the hopes that somehow, magically, sales will continue – in spite of no advertising or marketing.

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Here’s something that very well may (and should) change your perspective on “should I or shouldn’t I be advertising and marketing or even blogging?”

“The fortunes of a newspaper published out of a second-floor Chinatown Plaza office may give us insight into differing attitudes about money and ways of surviving tough economic times.

In a time when a 162-year-old national news chain such as the Tribune Co. file for bankruptcy protection, the Las Vegas Chinese Daily News is actually growing, fueled by an increase in advertising. The paper has gone from 16 to as many as 36 pages since printing its first copy five years ago.”

The article goes into further details by defining how different cultures view our current times; “…many Chinese business owners consider a time of economic stress a time to spend money on advertising.”

This advertising “outlook” is considered to be a definite separation of U.S. and Chinese cultures. Where the former sees nothing but doom and gloom when it comes to doing business, the latter are taking advantage of great rates and exceptional deals. These factors also attribute to the fact that over 20,000 valley residents of Chinese heritage are surviving the highest unemployment rates in a generation.

“Chinese attitudes about money include the notion of saving profits and growing slowly, instead of leveraging long lines of credit and expanding rapidly, several business owners said.”

Now here’s the best part, and what I’d really like you to come away with (having read this post… thank you):

“The Chinese rely more on what is known as a relational economy, compared to Americans, who function more in a “me economy.” The Chinese system is based more on, “I do something for you, you do something for me,” with everyone being on the same level.”

Sounds a lot like the Golden Rule applied with a fine paint brush to the art of keeping customers coming back by treating them right.

So if you’re asking yourself, “Is now a good time to slow down with my marketing and advertising?” we think it best to tell you the answer is no.

Recovering lost ground is costly.

Instead, plan and budget for an amount comfortable (and affordable) for you in today’s economy. Be it $10 or $1000, keep your business plans afloat and keep them growing.

We’ve said it before and we’ll keep on saying it. The internet waits for no man, woman, or child. Let up for even a tiny bit of time and your competitors are going to sweep right over you.

Your wise move is again budgeting. Keep your ads out there, continue investing your time and energy, too.

These rough times will not last forever, even if (in the moment) the light at the end of the tunnel doesn’t shine very brightly.

Stay on top of what you’ve been doing, and when the sunshine hits, you’ll be well positioned – ahead of your competition – in the months and years to come.

Rarely do Scott and I sign up for anything. Frankly, we’re way too busy helping other people market and advertise to take on additional 3rd party offers that also need telling about.

However, we’re making an exception for this one:

Click To See Which One

At the moment, during prelaunch it’s absolutely free to sign up. Listen to the short video and/or read along as the presentation happens at the bottom of the screen.

What it is is a large “must have” package of marketing tools.

The founders of Getresponse (Implix) and other major players are involved.

The tool we’re most interested in, which will come with the package, is the “gotomeeting” type service. We’re in sore need of something like this for training.

But that’s just one of many “must have marketing tools” with, of course, the added benefit of making residual income from a program that provides not junk, but real tools everyone needs to market effectively online!

We have many of them, but it turns out that by packaging them up come January 6th, when the program launches, we’ll be saving a ton of money, too!

So stop what you’re doing and go take a few minutes to get yourself positioned for this wonderful program launching at the New Year.

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This morning, following along the lines of yesterday’s post about Qassia, I just could not bring myself to type in junk. Sorry, must be me, but what someone had for breakfast is not my cup of tea (no pun intended).

So, I chose the high road, writing off-the-cuff. In other words, my experiment this time around opted to choose the “Unpublished original intel” option, and give it a go right from their website.

Here’s what I ended up writing (remember it’s not rocket science LOL!): (more…)

Sometimes I wonder about myself. I start at Point A only to arrive many clicks later at Point Z – which ultimately ends up providing me with the inspiration for my next post (even when I don’t find what I was really looking for!). Today is no exception.

I’m a regular subscriber to WebProNews and have been for years. Strangely enough I’ve seen “authority figures” poo-poo WPN in their forums, but I can tell you that the insights I get far outweigh the times where the information is intriguing albeit short of the mark. Doesn’t happen often, but some writers just don’t give you the full scoop. Whether their plan is to write more, or just provide surface-level research, I do not know. I have also read article bits and posts where I downright disagreed with the writer.

But that’s what makes WPN so interesting, and, more often than not, I get great input and ideas.

That said (that’s not an intentional plug, but will explain the convolution of the rest of this post nicely) that’s how today started out. (more…)

Recent posts (and throughout our archives), we demonstrate proof that there is money to be made online. And today’s post will be no exception to that rule. In fact, you’ll be downright excited at the prospects if you choose to keep reading! (We give you facts and figures for the truly skeptical that support what we’ve been advocating… blogging/writing your way to wealth). (more…)