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.

With the Super Bowl taking up most of today, that’s still no reason to miss out on some potential money making ideas for yourself online.

And we’ve got a truly interesting idea for you today.

Almost nine years ago, when I was just getting into the publishing online business, a friend of mine was running (and may still be, we fell out of touch) a highly successful catalog-type business – yes from online!

At the time, I was extremely busy doing other things, although in the back of my brain I knew she was on to something.

So, lucky you! This morning I came across how you can grab yourself a Free copy of Retailers Forum Magazine.

RetailersForum is going digital. Until recently it was only available in its offline form. However, now they plan to each month – on the 1st of each month – release their current free digital version!

What you’ll find are wholesale items like:

o Jewelry
o Apparel
o Gifts
o Novelties
o and more

They are even throwing in “informative business articles.”

RetailersForum offer to you is straightforward and very simple. They are inviting new startups or established businesses who need to find merchandise to read their free magazine!

Let’s face it, with times like they are having options to make money online is without a doubt critical. This company has been around so long that they helped others back during the recession of the 80s and 90s.

RetailForums has been in business since 1981, and it’s definitely worth a little effort on your part to visit that link above (put down the nachos for just two seconds) and see what they can do for your business online and off!

Enjoy!

After reading our friend and fellow Whole-Hog-Blogger, Judy at More Than Sew So and her current (at this time) post Who Is This Man, today I figured presenting some educational and highly enlightening new sources might be a better way to serve our Sunday readers (and beyond).

So I’ve compiled a short list of highly rated, highly regarded blogs whose sole purpose is to present news – current event style – on what’s really going on in Washington, as well as great pieces about the entertainment industry, sports, etc.

Here is the list:

The Daily Beast
Ana Marie Cox, writer and featured speaker on MSNBC news
The Huffington Post

Granted one must have an OPEN mind to read the above. I’ve heard them take all sides on all issues versus some out there that are strictly “old guard” trying valiantly to uphold that which clearly a majority of our nation turned down – emphatically – in November and celebrated – joyously – just a few days ago in Washington, D.C.

No one knows the future, but heading into the future without a plan, and flying on the old “wing and a prayer (and screw your fellow citizens) plan” obviously did not work. Wanting to stick to the same – for reasons unknown, but perhaps it is the “unknown” that scares some people – has moved our great country more than giant steps backward not forward.

My mind reels actually to hear most of what comes out of these news sources not because it’s BS, but what our government believes it can get away with (and until recently has) – and as We The People, we have let them.

I should at this point mention my two favorite news shows (television) which are programs over at MSNBC:

Countdown With Keith Olbermann and
The Rachel Maddow Show

But before I close, in the interest of maintaining a fuller spectrum of where to get your news, if you’re dead set on getting just the rhetoric of the die-hard GOP base, and feel it necessary to cling tenuously to the past, here are a few news sources online just for you:

Thinkgprogress.org (a misnomer, not much on “progress” but worth a laugh), along with FoxNews (which originally aired The Simpsons – a creative and very much “progressive” cartoon show for its time – but showed its true colors very early on – lopsided and biased and staunchly right winged – way right)

Enjoy your Sunday, and remember….

Give us your opinions – it is a free country let alone a “free” internet – your comments most welcome! Please comment!

Last night while posting about a free PDF creator, I also noticed something unusual about some (not all) of our links here at Online Internet Marketing Strategies. What I noticed was while we have the “dofollow” and “commentluv” plugins on this WordPress blog, they don’t always work properly.

So I went searching for a surefire cure to what we perceive as a problem (we want to give everyone who does comment the benefit of commenting!).

I found… (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…)